The actress and wife of John Travolta — who died from breast cancer in 2020 — would have been 62 on Oct. 13
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(1030x460:1032x462):format(webp)/Ella-Bleu-Travolta-Kelly-Preston-101324-c7cfcb36167543c59e834da28444a08b.jpg)
Ella Bleu Travolta is remembering mom Kelly Preston on what would’ve been her 62nd birthday.
The singer-songwriter, 24, marked her late mother’s birthday on Sunday, Oct. 13, with a throwback photo of the model-actress on Instagram.
Alongside the smiley shot of Preston, who died from breast cancer in 2020, Ella penned a short message to her mom.
“Happy Birthday, mama,” she wrote in the caption. “ I love you🤍.”
Ella’s dad, John Travolta, also shared a tribute to his late wife on his Instagram Stories. “Happy birthday Kelly. We love you!” he wrote under a red carpet shot of Preston.
Ella’s tribute to her mom comes shortly after she honored her memory with her single “Little Bird.”
To accompany the emotional track, the daughter of Preston and Travolta, 70, also released a music video that used family home videos featuring her late mom, as well as her dad and brother Benjamin, 13.
“[‘Little Bird’ is] about holding onto those pure relationships that you have with people that you lost and really just listening to yourself and staying true to that relationship with that person,” Ella told PEOPLE of the song. “It’s sort of the viewpoint of a mama bird talking to a baby bird and just not letting any other interference get in between it, because your true instincts were there all along.”
“It had been a couple years, obviously, since my mom’s passing, so I could look at the whole situation and take a step back from it and see what I wanted to communicate on it and what I wanted to communicate to her and what I was feeling in general,” she added.
Ella also said she “definitely” felt her mom “watching over me” as she worked on “Little Bird” and her EP Colors of Love. “I knew that she was really proud of this whole process and of me,” she explained.
The music video, meanwhile, is a “big compilation of some of my favorite memories,” Ella told , adding that she “wanted it to be as real and personal as possible.”
“I really wanted it to also be a celebration of life,” she said. “I think that’s so important, even when you lose someone, for it to be a celebration of their life [because] you got the chance to be with that person for as long as you did and you got to have these memories.”Since her mother’s death, Ella has penned several tributes to the late actress, who, along with dad Travolta, is “such a huge inspiration for a lot of things and how I lead my life,”
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(835x435:837x437):format(webp)/Ella-Bleu-John-Travolta-Kelly-Preston-101324-89854ca5a26e435ba388713f5b589211.jpg)
Shortly after she died in 2020, the singer wrote her a message on Instagram, which began, “I have never met anyone as courageous, strong, beautiful and loving as you.”
“Anyone who is lucky enough to have known you or to have ever been in your presence will agree that you have a glow and a light that never ceases to shine and that makes anyone around you feel instantly happy,” Ella continued. “Thank you for being there for me no matter what. Thank you for your love. Thank you for your help and thank you for making this world a better place.”
“You have made life so beautiful and I know you will continue to do so always. I love you so much mama,” she concluded the post.