See the 10 reasons why Jennifer Love Hewitt is big news

It has been a huge week for Jennifer Love Hewitt. Yes, the same actress, 41, who hasn’t exactly generated major coverage like this in years, if ever.

She’s announced that not only is she pregnant with her first child, but she’s also engaged to the daddy, actor Brian Hallisay.
She told us last year that she was in no mad rush to procreate, or get hitched.

“I’m at a place where I could get married, I could not get married,” she says. “Kids is not something I’ll give up on, that’s something I really want in my life but I just sort of started shifting my mind-set a little bit.”

A look at why her big news is such, well, big news, and generating the kinds of ongoing coverage that would make some of her more edgy peers foam at the mouth.

1. She’s relatable, and has had body issues, like nearly all the rest of us. After being mocked for her weight in 2007, she posted the following on her website: “I’ve sat by in silence for a long time now about the way women’s bodies are constantly scrutinized.

To set the record straight, I’m not upset for me, but for all the girls out there that are struggling with their body image.” She went further: “A size 2 is not fat! Nor will it ever be. And being a size 0 doesn’t make you beautiful.”

2. We’ve seen her grow up, first as part of Disney’s Kids Incorporated and most famously, as the emotional Sarah Reeves Merrin on the hit Fox show Party of Five.

3. She’s not a career snob. Unlike some other actors, who sneer at TV work, Hewitt has found her niche and sticks to it. She’s headlining the Lifetime series The Client List, about a woman involved in running a nefarious massage parlor.

4. Her Twitter is a cheery blend of the promotional, hyping her show, and the sugary uplifting. A few sample posts:
June 1: Life is simply beautiful! Today is all about being grateful.

May 15: If you haven’t tasted Ben and Jerry’s Americone ice cream you are missing out! It’s amazing! Thank you Ben and Jerry!

5. Without naming names, so many actors in Hollywood look constipated and angsty, and treat their jobs like a brutal chore. Not Hewitt, who’s rarely seen without a smile on her face. Maybe it’s all an act, but she’s perky, upbeat and seems grateful for her very sweet lot in life.

6. Again, like so many of us, Hewitt has been rather unlucky in love, until she began dating Hallisay. Her romantic past includes Scottish actor Ross McCall and Jamie Kennedy. And she’s not squeamish about discussing her stumbles.

7. She’s not shy about assessing her assets. “It’s horrible to say, but I like my boobs,” she told Maxim magazine last year. “They’ve always served me well. They’re good.”

8. When she spoke to us, she went one further: “I need, like, an insurance invitation. If somebody was like, ‘Hey, you know what? We would like to insure your boobs for $2.5 million,’ I’d be like, ‘Do it. Love it! Why not?’ ” laughed Hewitt, who wears a size 36C bra. She then pointed to her chest and joked, “These things right here are worth $5 million!”

9. She doesn’t take herself all that seriously, joking around in interviews and cutting up about herself. She admits to starving herself before doing a sexy shoot: “For days I was just like, ‘Let me suck on an ice cube and pretend it’s chicken.’ ”

10. She reveals just enough to reporters to always, always stay interesting, without treading into TMI territory. “I’ve cut down on the lingerie in my own life because I wear it all the time,” she told us. “So, it’s like I don’t want to go home and even think about another cute bra and panties set. I’m over it!”