It's amazing how quickly the hours, days, and weeks trickle by when you add a newborn to the mix. I've been meaning to write this post into at least three different ones over the past two weeks, and every time I think I'm going to be able to carve out an hour to do it, that hour mysteriously ends up disappearing into a multi-hour feed-a-thon or a trip out to Costco for formula or a nap that I didn't realize I was in desparate need of. So while this update may be a bit scatter-shot with a wide variety of information, I hope to make up for it with an abundance of pictures.

January's best friend in the whole wide world happens to live almost 4500 miles away in Europe, but that didn't stop her from taking the international flight so Lucy could meet her Aunt Tasci. While she stayed with us at our house for most of that time, she really felt less of a guest -- where you have that obligation to entertain -- and more like an awesome family member who really is there to lend a hand when it's needed most. I can't even tell you how incredible it was to have an extra adult around, especially when they are willing to watch your newborn in the morning so mama can get caught up on sleep and papa can focus on work, or when she's willing to watch her for an evening so you can go off to the hospital to visit your brand new nephew.  More on that later, though.

As if entertaining her first international visitor wasn't exciting enough, Lucy is very much looking forward to her first international travel experience this coming September, when the three of us pack our bags and head to the Czech Republic for Tasci and Honza's wedding. This kid is going to have visited more countries in her first year than I did in my first twenty. And, frankly, I think that's just good parenting.

On March 1, exactly four weeks after Lucy's birth, my sister went into the hospital to give birth to their second child. About twenty hours later, baby William Martin was welcomed into the world, and we wasted no time visiting them in the hospital.

It's crazy how much a newborn can grow in a week. Lucy started off just over 8 pounds, dropped one in the hospital, and now is up around the 11 pound mark. All of this growth kind of goes unrecognized when you're the one picking her up day in and day out, but when we went to the hospital to visit Will for the first time, the difference in weight is incredible.  Now, Will was about a pound lighter than Lucy when she was born, but picking him up is like picking up nothing at all. 

We actually got to the hospital right as my parents showed up with Emma, Will's older sister, so we got to watch as big sis met her new little brother for the very first time. She was pretty excited to meet him, and by the end of the afternoon she had decided that it would be ok if they took him home to live with them.

Nearly two weeks later, everyone is home and healthy and on their way to getting used to life in a four-person family.

As for our three-person family, we're starting to get a little stir crazy. Going into this, I was prepared for the first six weeks to be crazy, frustrating, and exhausting, and really it has been so much easier overall than I expected. What I didn't expect was the week six cabin fever that we're starting to experience.  The routine of feeding / diaper changing / napping is still going relatively well, but the constantness of it is beginning to take its toll. We're already getting nostalgic for the days when we could just go out to dinner at a restaurant on a moment's notice, or stay up late watching a dumb movie. Don't get me wrong, Lucy is a pretty good kid, and we've been able to get out of the house a few times for a lunch at a more casual restaurant like Katalina's or Piada, but at this point an evening out feels like a dream that is lost forever. 

With Lucy at six weeks old, though, we're starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel, where she will be old enough that we feel comfortable leaving her with a grandparent for a evening. Next month in fact, the three of us will be taking our first roadtrip to Chicago as January shoots her first wedding of the season. We've enlisted the help of my parents, so we're super excited to be out of the house for an entire weekend, with two extra pairs of hands to help us out with our litte lady.

Until then, though, we're biding our time in this house. We did finally take the time for a little photoshoot the other day, so I'll leave you with a few pictures of our little girl, taken between weeks four and six.

If you want even more, you can see the rest of the shoot on the Team Soell Flickr account.