She married a man whose great passion is recovering ancient shipwrecks, but Veronica Webb is pretty grounded. After a long run at the top of the modeling business, the Detroit native explored a number of endeavors, including acting and writing. She was also prepping for her biggest job to date: Becoming a mom. "There was never a doubt in my mind that I'd have kids," Webb says. "But I waited until I had sown my oats and was financially and emotionally ready."
That moment came five years ago, when Webb married former financial executive George Robb and plunged into a very different life. Moving from New York City to Florida, she played stepmom to Robb's two teenagers from his previous marriage before having her own kids, Leila and Molly. "There's no way to imagine how challenging parenthood is until it's on you," she says. "And after all that freedom, it was a shock to be so scheduled and cloistered. I learned more in those first few years than from any other experiences I'd had."
But there's one lesson from her past that carried over. While Webb describes her relationship with her own mother as "inspired," she wasn't as close to her father as she would have liked. "He was older, and we were his second family," she says. "I never won his attention in the way I wanted." To prevent this from happening with her own daughters, she has made sure they have maximum quality time with their papa by devising a mini tutorial in oceanography. "From day one, I introduced them to things he loves—the ocean and its creatures, diving, botany," she says.
That often means joining Robb on his expeditions. (His RPM Nautical Foundation returns artifacts to the countries in which they were discovered.) They met up with him after crossing the Atlantic on the Queen Mary 2. "It's a great way to travel with children—no jet lag," she says. Clearly, Webb has the big trip with kids down pat: "Familiar things from home count for a lot. When you're gone that long, it makes a big difference to put your head on your own pillow." Such jaunts may soon have to be scaled back, though, since Webb signed on as cohost of the upcoming Bravo series Tim Gunn's Guide to Style. While it's the perfect gig for this unrepentant clotheshorse (she and Gunn will be dispensing tips to the fashion-challenged), she isn't about to let parenting, even the nitty-gritty stuff, take a backseat. "The minutiae of toilet training and Dora talk can get to you," she admits. "But everything you do for your children matters."
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