Fayetteville 4-year-old reunites with Army dad on 'The Jennifer Hudson Show'

A 4-year-old Fayetteville girl was reunited with her father Friday on "The Jennifer Hudson Show."

The Fayetteville Observer reports Ava Shanelle, a child model, and appeared on the show after going viral on social media for her extreme confidence and adorable model walk on local runways.

She thought she was on the show to teach Hudson to model, but she was surprised when she was reunited with her father -- a U.S. Army sergeant stationed in Germany for more than a year -- on set.

Viewers watched the heartfelt reunion at 3 p.m. when the show aired on FOX 50.

Her mother, Devonda Hunter, said 4-year-old Ava is an "international runway model and model coach" who is eager to show off her skills.

Ava was born in Kansas but moved to Fayetteville at 2 weeks old. She currently attends kindergarten at Renaissance Classical Christian Academy.

Hunter said Ava's modeling career began with pageants.

"She was 2 walking around Walmart doing the pageant wave," said Hunter, who doubles as her daughter's agent. Ava has been in four pageants and in 2021, she won the North Carolina Natural Baby Supreme pageant, Hunter said.

Ava's and her mom's TikTok have nearly 50,000 followers and over 765,000 likes on more than six dozen videos. The most viewed video on the platform is of Ava confidently walking a runway. It's been watched four million times since it was posted in November 2022.

"She started modeling last year and continued to go viral," Hunter said.

Hunter said Ava's path to Hollywood and Hudson's show began in early October when producers from the program contacted Hunter through Instagram.