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On a recent balmy Friday morning in a gated community of a Nashville, Tennessee suburb, Kristin Cavallari, husband Jay Cutler, and their two towheaded children, Camden, who turns three in August, and Jaxon, 13 months, gather in the lush front yard of their home. Today is the last day of a six-day shoot—two days in Los Angeles, four in Nashville—for 28-year-old Cavallari's forthcoming lifestyle book, Balancing in Heels, which will contain chapters on topics ranging from "mommy" to "wife" to health and business. If you look closely at the cuddling foursome, theirs looks like the average, if not slightly better looking, young American family.

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"Cam is so happy that he's here," Cavallari notes of her eldest son, who is never far from his father's leg. Best known as the recalcitrant quarterback for the Chicago Bears, Cutler is large but not imposing. With crystal blue eyes, hulking arms, and a slightly sloped chin, he resembles an overgrown frat king. But whether tussling with Camden or preparing bacon for breakfast, the Vanderbilt alum has the focused discipline of a father whose time is professionally bifurcated. Case in point: He has just flown in the previous night for this shoot; the family will depart back to Chicago on Monday in time for organized team activities and preseason obligations. But when he is at home he is neither football star nor recluse. He's simply Dad.

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And though the family—who is expecting its fifth member—is very rarely in Nashville, this is where, "if all goes according to plan," Cavallari says diplomatically, they hope to settle down when Cutler's six-year contract concludes. "Jay hates L.A.," Cavallari says with the clipped laugh that once seemed sarcastic on TV, but now reads as knowingly tolerant. "And Chicago's just not home."

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If you take a step back from the intimate moment the family is sharing on the front yard, just a small patch of green on the expertly-maintained grounds that include six bedrooms, 10.5 bathrooms, a movie theater, a pool, a several-car garage, a gazebo, and stretches of manicured lawn large enough to accommodate a long pass from a good arm, you'll see that something is just a bit too perfect. Though the family is casually dressed, Cavallari's outfit—a loose pink tank top to hide her miniscule-but-growing belly and white jeans—was selected by a stylist. Her hair, though unfussy with lived-in beach waves, was done along with her make-up starting at 6:30 a.m.

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The scene of clandestine closeness is one created for and by a team that includes two employees from the publisher, a photographer and his assistant, Cavallari's publicist, her hair and make-up team, and a couple of other in-the-know associates. After some focused clicks of the camera, and a few wisps of hair are freed from the nude gloss on Cavallari's lips, the group disbands. Cutler, who is wearing the Nantucket-red pants and a white, V-neck T-shirt his wife approved, jokingly informs the crowd that he's "nailed it" before charging toward the house with Camden. Cavallari expertly cradles Jaxon in one arm while her eight-year-old Yorkie, Bardot, nuzzles in the grass by her feet. Despite today being about business, the hands-on parents radiate the casualness that permeates all lived-in relationships. Without their in-the-trenches shorthand, palpable fondness for one another, and a shared, slightly dry sense of humor, the setup might read as inauthentic. And therein lies the intrigue: This is a real family making the difficult decision to share their private life with the public.

Morrigan McCarthy

When asked why she continues to negotiate with an industry as fickle as Hollywood, Cavallari reminds me that she's been working since she was 14 years old. "I was a hostess when MTV came," she says, bundled up in a cashmere throw on an oversize couch in a living room littered with toys and the clutter of two little boys. "We filmed Thursday to Sunday, which is typically when I would host, so I had to quit my job essentially to do the show—and we got paid. So, yeah, I looked at it as a job." It's a pretty cynical outlook for a teenager who, along with about a dozen of her surf-loving, beach-highlighted schoolmates, was cast in the MTV series that would all but define aspirational youth for a generation. But, according to Cavallari, the premise of Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County was never properly explained to its subjects. "No one knew what that show was going to become, obviously," she says. "I had envisioned it being, like, do you remember True Life on MTV? I thought it was going to be like that. None of us knew that it was going to be turned into a soap opera. And, so, filming the first season, we were sort of just going along with it, listening to producers, doing what they asked, not realizing—me especially—that we were going to be edited the way we were." The age-old plot that catapulted its two female leads, Kristin Cavallari and Lauren Conrad, into enduring fame was also news to the ensemble's feisty underdog. "I also didn't realize the love triangle was going on," she says while Cutler and Camden roughhouse with a toy dustbuster on the carpet beneath her feet. "Steven [Colletti] was my real boyfriend, so that was really difficult for me to watch. Even though a lot of it was manipulated and for the show, it's still hard to see your boyfriend going and hanging out with a girl that he probably normally wouldn't. It was tough for me." Of the media's lasting fascination with their feud: "You were either the Lauren or you were the Kristin."

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Over the course of two seasons of Laguna and two seasons of its spinoff, The Hills, Cavallari emerged as the franchise's most watchable villain. And whether or not the queen bee persona jibed with the insecurity that derived from being a sophomore year transfer into a world full of utopian privilege, Cavallari got used to keeping her friends and enemies both at arm's length. "I moved around so much when I was younger that I sort of had to have this type of exterior, you know, I was afraid of getting hurt," she says. "What I do think came through on the show is that I didn't stress about the little stuff. I was kind of a tough girl. And I guess that came through, like, moving around, my parents getting a divorce, different step families, and stuff like that. I'd been through a little bit more than most people who are just from Laguna Beach."

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She considered other paths, ones that didn't include reprising a trumped-up role of herself, but ultimately felt unready (or unable) to reject fame entirely. After a brief stint at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, she found herself dropping out to pursue a different kind of hosting gig. "Get This Party Started. Ugh. Such a bad show. It was horrible. It got canceled, but I filmed all eight episodes so I was on the road," she says. "[At Loyola] I took public speaking, which is just like my biggest fear. The first day we went around, everyone said their names and I was like, 'Hi, I'm Kristin Cavallari from Laguna Beach' and the girls were like 'Oh my God. That show!' and I was like, 'I just don't want to be here' [laughs]. So, I just kind of had an excuse to drop out and blame it on the show, whatever, I could have continued, but..."

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A series of small roles (Van Wilder: Freshman Year and The League) and reality TV appearances (Bethenny and Fashion News Live) continued to present themselves, but Cavallari—who began dating Cutler in 2010, gave birth to Camden Jack in 2012, and married Cutler in Nashville in 2013—found herself shrinking away from that world. "I sort of have stepped out of the public eye and it's actually been really refreshing," she says. "I was a little nervous at first, to be honest, just because I didn't…It's sort of always been ingrained in me that if you want to be in the entertainment business, you either have to be in L.A. or New York. And so when I married Jay, I officially moved to Chicago. I was a little scared. I didn't really know exactly what I wanted to do with my career, but everything has sort of fallen into place with the shoes, especially, the jewelry, and now this book."

Morrigan McCarthy

But like anyone else who the public perceives as having been gifted a better life on a silver platter, Cavallari is not without her detractors. In anticipation of Balancing in Heels, Defamer launched a tongue-in-cheek column called "500 Days of Kristin"; a statement about a controversial parenting choice has courted Internet backlash. "She's trying to make me sound stupid," Cavallari says of the author who writes the satirical countdown, "but all it's doing is giving my book really good publicity." And with regard to the latter, she doesn't consider herself a spokesperson for any movement. "I wasn't really prepared and that's really the only time I've ever commented on it," she says. "But it's something that I believe in...everything that we do, we wholeheartedly believe in. There's no point in talking about it because it's just an uphill battle and the amount of crap you're going to get is just not worth it sometimes."

Morrigan McCarthy

It's only 12:30 p.m., but Cavallari has already donned four outfits, two hairstyles, accidentally walked out of her closet wearing a pair of fringed Kristin Cavallari for Chinese Laundry booties on the wrong feet, ordered enough barbecue for a small army, fed her kids healthy breakfasts and lunches, taste tested product for a potential new health-conscious endorsement, fired off a grip of e-mails, and gone on a simulated movie date with her husband. (One of the set-ups for Balancing in Heels, presumably for the wife chapter, is of the couple cozied up with a bowl of popcorn on a long, quilted, L-shaped couch.) As the photographer's assistant strains to light the scenario just so, I observe from behind the bar area, which is empty save for a signed copy of fashion correspondent's Louise Roe's recent lifestyle effort, Front Roe: How to Be the Leading Lady in Your Own Life. Cutler is up to his antics again. "You'd be watching a movie in shorts?" he ribs as the duo toss fistfuls of air-popped popcorn into their mouths. She gives him a faux stern look before nuzzling closer under the same gray cashmere throw she earlier had pulled tightly around her body. She seems relaxed, in good spirits, and acutely aware of the absurdity of the situation. She seems at home.

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