Nick Carter Says Daughter Saoirse, 3, ‘Won’t Let Me Sing to Her Anymore’: She Gets ‘Too Emotional’

“So, I’m a little sad about that,” Nick Carter tells PEOPLE, explaining that his 3-year-old daughter Saoirse Reign won’t let him sing to her anymore

Photo: nick carter/instagram

Nick Carter’s biggest critic is also the apple of his eye.

Daddy’s little girl is growing up too quickly for the Grammy Award nominee, 42, who tells PEOPLE that his 3-year-old daughter Saoirse Reign “won’t let me sing to her anymore” as he opens up about juggling parenthood with touring.

“I used to sing to all my kids when they were really young,” he explains. “So, I’d hold them, and I’d walk with them and hum to them and sing to them before they’d go to bed.

“My daughter, Saoirse … I don’t know if she just gets really too emotional or something, but if I pick up a guitar and I start to sing, she tells me to stop. She’s like, ‘No, daddy, stop.’ She won’t let me sing to her anymore. So, I’m a little sad about that,” Carter adds.

He also shares son Odin Reign, 6½, and 18-month-old daughter Pearl with wife Lauren Kitt, whom he married in 2014.

Nick Carter and his three kids. nick carter/instagram

Carter notes that not all of his kids are over the family’s musical ties, as Pearl “loves to sing and they’re always singing Frozen songs, always singing Encanto, all those different things.

“So it’s in them… On one hand you think, maybe they won’t want to be associated with music or in the industry, but it’s kind of hard because this is all we’ve done since we were so young,” Carter says.

The Backstreet Boys member previously revealed that Saoirse is “the one that loves to sing,” and he often would find her “in the crib singing to herself.”

Backstreet Boys. Ethan Miller/Getty

“I’m really excited to perform and have her be in the audience for the first time, because she really loves music. She loves to sing,” Carter said on Parents magazine’s We Are Family podcast in March. “Her and I actually, we do a back-and-forth thing sometimes. She actually can harmonize, which is pretty impressive.”

Carter, who has been with the Backstreet Boys since its formation in 1993, is currently on the European leg of the their DNA World Tour. They’re also ringing in the holidays a little early with the release of their new album, A Very Backstreet Christmas.

“And right before we left to go on the road. I totally missed my middle daughter’s 3rd birthday,” he tells PEOPLE, adding that it was “sad” but his fellow Backstreet Boys were there to help him through it.

“Some of the other guys have actually gone through it, where they haven’t been able to be home because the schedules just pretty much conflict. So I experienced that for the first time,” Carter continues. “But again, FaceTime helps, talking to them all the time, touching base with them. And, for us, it’s our life. It’s what we’ve done our whole life in regards to traveling. So they’re kind of adjusting to it.”