Before Beyoncé, Solange, and Kelly Rowland rose to stardom, they were three girls growing up in Houston, Texas. Having had a front-row seat to each of these women’s journeys, Tina Knowles now reminisces on some of her favorite memories from their childhoods. Posting a clip from a video interview with Vogue, Knowles revealed that Beyoncé was once bullied as a kid.
“Beyoncé, she was very shy and she got bullied a bit,” she said about the “Cowboy Carter” singer. “But the day that she stood up for someone — she didn’t stand up for herself, she stood up for them… I couldn’t have been more proud of her.”
According to Mama Knowles, both Beyoncé and her sister Solange shared the advocacy trait. While Beyoncé was standing up for herself and others on the playground, she said, Solange was gathering signatures for petitions.
“[My favorite memory with] Solange was her signing a petition in school; she was only in like fifth grade and she was out getting petitions signed,” Knowles added in the video. “So she’s always been an activist.”
Though Rowland is not Knowles’ biological daughter, she considers her a daughter. At 11 years old, Rowland moved into the Knowles household and was raised alongside Beyoncé and Solange.
“I grew up with Beyoncé, her sister Solange, her mother Tina and her eldest cousin Angie. It was a real sisterhood,” Rowland once told Marie Claire.
“Kelly was always this kid that just tried to protect everybody,” Knowles told Vogue “I have a memory of her with her best friend Barbara and her being a mediator and just being this little peacemaker.”
While she still may be a peacemaker among her friends, Rowland recently made headlines at the Cannes Film Festival after having to affirm her boundaries with a security guard.
“I have a boundary, and I stand by those boundaries. And that is it,” Rowland said, as previously reported by theGrio. “I stood my ground, and she felt like she had to stand hers.”
Just as Knowles enjoyed raising her “three girls,” the Cécred co-founder now appreciates hanging out with her grandchildren.
“They are always saying things that just make me laugh,” she told Vogue. “If I’m having a bad day, that is the best thing I can do…go and hook up with my grandkids.”
“Each child is different! But all so special,” she captioned her Instagram post. “I believe kids are born with their personalities. My three girls all handled things very differently. Learn their personalities and respect [their] individuality. Never compare the negatives, always praise the positive differences and pay attention to the things that you can brag on about them. They love it and it encourages positive behavior.”