all smiles!

I'm so sorry I haven't posted in almost a month -- wow, the time has flown!

We're all doing well, and continuing to enjoy life as a threesome. :) It has become even more fun now that Gwyneth has begun responding to us and - you guessed it - smiling!! She wakes up every morning with the most beautiful grin. I haven't been able to get a picture of one of her big gummy smiles yet, but I have gotten some of her little grins.

It's amazing already to look back at pictures of her first week; she's changed so much, and put on so much weight! We bought a baby scale a few weeks ago, and it's been fun to weigh her every few days to watch her progress. She started out at 5 lb. 14 oz., and is now up to about 9 1/2 lbs!! So much of her weight is in length -- I've included a picture of her lying next to one of her burp clothes when she was two weeks old, and one of her lying on a burp cloth just yesterday; can you believe how much longer she is?!?

She still loves her sleep, and is only awake for about 6 hours of each day. She still has some nights when she wants to be fed every 3 or 4 hours, but earlier this week she slept for 9 hours straight! I'll tell you what - I certainly appreciated that much sleep in one stretch! She's been going to bed at about 6:00 for the last two weeks. I would love to be able to keep her up longer so that Jason could have more time with her on the weeknights, but it's just impossible to keep her awake! Once she decides to sleep, that's all she wrote. One upside to her early bedtime is that we've been leading a Wednesday night Bible study for the college students, and she sleeps thru the whole thing, allowing us to have it in our home. Sunday mornings are another story; she tends to be awake a bit during the Sunday school hour, and I've been tempted not to go simply to keep the girls from being distracted by her! They sure do love little Gwyneth, and we will definitely have no shortage of great babysitters when we get to that stage.

Well, the weather is beginning to be more spring-like here (although not without wintery days; snow is in the forecast for the coming week). We bought a jogging stroller a couple of weeks ago, and it's been wonderful to get outside with Gwyneth. She falls asleep almost before we've left our driveway; it will be fun when she's awake more to enjoy the beautiful outdoors with us!

Jason has been in Virginia this week for a business trip, and I'm so excited that he's on the last leg of his flight home right now!! Tomorrow is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous, and we're both looking forward to spending the whole day together outside.

Ok, I'll hang it up for now... hope you enjoy the pictures, and have a wonderful weekend!

Here she is at 2 weeks...

And now... look how much bigger she is!!

There's that grin!She just loves looking at the big window in her nursery.

Some Daddy time...

Some Mommy time...

Some Petey time...Some outside time...

Sweet little sleeper

You'll notice a theme to this post's pictures... isn't she beautiful when she sleeps? :) I've never been this way before, but I suddenly find myself taking dozens of pictures of the same sweet pose or expression -- thank goodness for digital!

Gwyneth will be three weeks old at 1:18 tomorrow morning. It's so hard to believe that much time has already gone by since we brought her home! And yet, in some ways, the days have seemed so long (but not in a bad way). I think it's because for the first time in my life, I'm actually experiencing all 24 hours in the day, with nighttime sleep feeling more like naps. Although we certainly can't complain about our nights... three nights ago, Gwyneth slept for 7 hours straight!! She went to bed at 8:00, and we both woke up at 3 a.m. and debated whether we should wake her or not (we just didn't think it was possible for a little one to sleep that long!...). She makes all sorts of sweet little sounds in her sleep that you can hear thru the monitor, so we knew she was okay, and we finally decided to let her keep sleeping. She must have known we were talking about her, though, because she woke up about 20 minutes later with a rumbly in her tumbly. :):)

Jason and I are doing well, and enjoying these first weeks of parenting. Even with the feedings, diaper changes, and playtimes, we've still been able to continue having wonderful time together in the evenings, and during her naps on the weekends. And our time together with Gwyneth is so precious! Last Sunday, when the weather was gorgeous, we went for a walk on the trails near our house -- one of the pictures I've included is from just after the walk when we bundled Gwyneth up in Jason's coat. Doesn't she look as snug as a bug in a rug, and ten times as cute?

All right, enough for now... I'll post again sometime next week.

We love you all and hope you're doing well!