Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes' Kids: Everything They've Said About Parenting

Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes are enjoying life as partners and parents as they raise their kids together.

The couple — who have been together since 2011 — first met while filming The Place Beyond the Pines and have since welcomed two children: daughters Esmeralda Amada, 10, and Amada Lee, 8.

After playing a pretend family with Mendes in the 2012 film, Gosling realized he wanted to start a family of his own with the actress.

"I wasn’t thinking about kids before I met her, but after I met Eva, I realized that I just didn’t want to have kids without her," The Notebook star told GQ in 2023, adding, "and there were moments on The Place Beyond the Pines where we were pretending to be a family, and I didn’t really want it to be pretend anymore."

Gosling and Mendes stay fairly tight-lipped about their personal lives, especially regarding their daughters.

"I have always had a clear boundary when it comes to my man and my kids. I'll talk about them of course, with limits, but I won't post pictures of our daily life," Mendes wrote on Instagram in 2020. "Since my children are still so little and don't understand what posting their image really means, I don't have their consent. And I won't post their image until they're old enough to give me consent."

When the family attended the 2024 Paris Olympics together, Mendes shared an Instagram post about how "grateful" she was that the media chose not to show her daughters' faces. In response to one comment, she wrote, "I love @nbcolympics didn't cut away to the kids! And most sites blurred their faces so mama bear is happy about that."

In August 2023, a source told PEOPLE that Gosling and Mendes are "hands-on parents and have little help." The insider added, "When they are not working, they are all about their girls."

Gosling echoed that while talking to Variety in February 2024. "It's going super fast. I hear the clock ticking," he said, referring to time with his daughters. "I don't know how much time I'm going to get and I don't want to spend it in the wrong place. I know I'm not spending it in the wrong place if I'm with family."

Here's everything Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes have said about their kids: Esmeralda and Amada.

Esmeralda Amada Gosling, 10

Gosling and Mendes' first child, Esmeralda Amada, was born in Santa Monica, California on Sept. 12, 2014. The couple kept news of their pregnancy a secret for as long as possible, with a source telling PEOPLE that Mendes "just hasn't ever wanted anyone beyond her close friends and family knowing more than they had to. And Ryan is certainly private and always has been."

When Esmeralda was born, it was love at first sight for the new parents. "Ryan is madly in love with the baby," an insider told PEOPLE at the time. "[Mendes is] absolutely in heaven being a mom. She's never been happier ... She and Ryan are just in awe of this beautiful person they created. It's a really special time for them."

Mendes also stepped away from acting temporarily to be a stay-at-home mom, a role she described as "way harder" than her acting career. "People are so sweet — they really try to warn you, prep you, when you're pregnant, but nobody can prep you. Nobody," she said.

While Mendes took a break to focus on family, Gosling still went to work — and it paid off. A few years after becoming a father, Gosling won a Golden Globe for his performance in La La Land and thanked his partner and daughters in his acceptance speech.

"While I was singing and dancing and playing piano ... my lady was raising our daughter, pregnant with our second and trying to help her brother fight his battle with cancer," he said. "Sweetheart, thank you. To my daughters, Amada and Esmeralda, I love you."

The actor then dedicated his award in memory of Mendes' older brother, Juan Carlos Mendes, who died the previous April.

Since becoming parents, Mendes and Gosling have occasionally spoken publicly about their family — and Mendes has even gone on the record praising Esmeralda's creativity.

"My 5-year-old cut her socks, the foot part off, and she likes to wear socks as sleeves," she said in 2020. "And the other day she wore underwear as a hat and I was like, 'That's amazing.' I wish I could do that. I can't."

Amada Lee Gosling, 8

It wasn't until one month before Mendes gave birth to her second child that the public caught wind that she was expecting. Mendes and Gosling welcomed their second daughter, Amada Lee, on April 29, 2016.

Amada is named after Mendes' grandmother; the moniker also means "beloved" in Spanish.

According to Mendes, she and Gosling have the same parenting style: "controlling."

"I think what the term is — we're always laughing at these terms — I think we would be 'bulldozing parents,' " she said on The Kelly Clarkson Show when Amada was 3 years old. "We have to be on top of them every second ... The stakes are really high, so yeah, I'm a helicopter parent. And then I heard the bulldozing and I'm like, 'Ooh, yeah, I'm probably a bulldozing parent too.' "

Mendes has also shared that she finds her kids "inspiring" because of their freedom and creativity. "They'll just be like, 'Can I wear socks on my hands today?' " she told PEOPLE in 2019. "And I'm like, 'Yes, of course you can wear socks on your hands today.' So we make that happen."

"Or they'll get a Halloween costume that we have hanging out and they'll wear that with pajama pants and a headband, and it's so cool," she added. "It's just such a freedom."

Both Gosling and Mendes' daughters were young when the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, and keeping the girls home in quarantine was a challenge they shared with parents everywhere.

"Trying to keep things light at home with my two little ones," she captioned a video of a vinyl record. "Nothing like some old Cuban music to do the trick. And yes that's my 3-year-old [Amada] on the piano. I think she thinks the music is coming from her. And I'm not about to correct her."

A few months later, Mendes shared a hilarious selfie, showing off a colorful new makeup look courtesy of her two daughters. "They’ve won ❤️," she captioned the shot, which featured neon blue eyeshadow, purple lipstick, and green and black scribbles on her forehead.

Mendes has been vocal about fostering creativity and giving her kids artistic freedom, telling Byrdie in 2022, "I really feel like when we're bored — not stimulated by a phone, or an iPad, or computer or television — that's when ideas come in. Sometimes it's fun, sometimes it's dangerous, and sometimes it's enlightening. I really want it to be the summer of boredom."