: easily moved to love, pity, or sorrow

When I was in the 7th grade, one of my good friends lost his father. I didn't know his dad at all, but I knew the impact that loss was to my friend. I remember sitting at the edge of my bed bawling. My mom came in my room and put her arm around me and muttered the words, "Jennifer, you have always been so tenderhearted, Michael is lucky to have you as a friend."

This week has been super emotional for me. The woman who takes care of my girls learned that her husband has a treatable disease, but with his age comes great concern. My grandparents are both fighting various ailments. About twenty minutes ago I learned of a great disappointment from one of my friends. My heart is so heavy because I am tenderhearted : easily moved to love, pity or sorrow.

It's funny because I was getting my hair done the other day and the lady told me that I give off a very confident vibe. That I come across as I have everything together. HA! Those of you who know the real me know that I struggle with such petty things. I want to be perfect under all of the hats that I wear, but I am far from it. I may come across strong, but let me be the first to tell you I am so very weak.

I wear my heart on my sleeve. Those of you who are close to me, who have been willing to look past the strong exterior know that I melt in your kind words and hugs. My heart is extended in so many directions right now. I love and I need to be loved.

Updates

We have had an incredibly busy, fun, emotional, cold and lovely Christmas break. We had Christmas in California on the 17th with my side of the family and had a lot of fun. On the 20th we loaded up the car and drove to Oregon to have Christmas with Brian's family. I'm bummed that I haven't updated more recently, but with how busy we were with the drive and such I just haven't had the time. Here are some updates--

Kinley is WALKING! She started about a month ago (1o months). We got excited by 1-4 steps, then it was 5-8 steps and then it was all of the time. She's definitely walking more than crawling and it has made it for a very interesting time around the house.

Kinley loves to play "where's kinley" during EVERY meal. She loves to eat and wants to eat whatever is on our plates. So, if we try to give her something different it's all over.

Kinley whines just about every morning until EMily gets up and then she starts to giggle when she sees her. They are the best of friends. Emily loves to get her to laugh.

Emily is so smart she takes my breath away. She remembers so many things, re-tells stories that happened six months ago. She knows her numbers, colors, shapes.

Emily LOVES to sing and dance. It's quite fascinating. It's like she bottled it up and now bursts every time a song comes on.

If Emily gets caught doing something she isn't supposed to be doing she just looks up at us and says, "I love you."

Christmas was a bit confusing this year because we had FOUR different celebrations. So, we didn't really play up the whole Santa bit, don't get me wrong, we did talk about Santa, but I figured talking with her about Jesus' birth was much more worthy to talk about. We've been talking a lot about the story of Jesus and today she put the BIGGEST smile on my face when she told me she knew where Jesus lived. I asked her where and she said, "Jesus lives in my heart." Melted me...