NATCHEZ &8212; Peaceful in pink, the three tiny babies, Faith, Hope and Joy, lay quietly in their beds on Friday, celebrating their three-week birthday, home together at last. It was a rare moment of calm to savor.

Mother Sanita Gutter smiled as she sighed, &8220;I haven&8217;t been to sleep in I don&8217;t know when.&8221;

Grandmother Chris Malone spoke up, &8220;But what a blessing they are. I tell my daughter, &8216;now don&8217;t forget you named them Faith, Hope and Joy when they start cutting up.&8217;&8221;

Think about it, the mother and grandmother said. Three babies &8212; &8220;and they are on exactly the same schedule,&8221; Malone said. &8220;They want to eat at exactly the same time, just like clockwork.&8221;

Bottles lined the counters in the kitchen. Evidence of a new baby in the house appeared everywhere &8212; times three.

&8220;We&8217;ve been up day and night and night and day, and there has been some praying going on,&8221; Malone said.

The triplets&8217; dad, Mitchell Gutter, was at work. &8220;He is so excited,&8221; Sanita Gutter said.

This family has an edge on some others that have been surprised by triplets. The mother worked as a social worker for the preschool Head Start program.

The grandmother is a licensed practical nurse who has spent years caring for newborns. In recent years, the two owned a daycare center together.

Gutter, also the mother of a 10-year-old son, Alec Chandler, knew the pregnancy was different from the start, even before her first doctor&8217;s appointment.

Imagine her surprise, however: &8220;The doctor said, &8216;you&8217;re not going to believe this. It&8217;s triplets.&8217; I was speechless. I almost fainted. My temperature went up, and my blood pressure went up. I was seeing stars. I don&8217;t remember anything else he said,&8221; Gutter said.

She had celebrated her 35th birthday only days before. And she was not taking fertility drugs. &8220;But I found out that twins run in my mother&8217;s family,&8221; she said.

The triplets were in two sacs, identical twins in one and the third baby in the other. They weighed 4 pounds, 3 ounces; 3 pounds, 14 ounces; and 3 pounds, 10 ounces. Now all are safely above 5 pounds.

Their full names are Amani Faith Gutter, Ameri Hope Gutter and Amaya Joy Gutter. The family decided to call the babies by their middle names.

&8220;They were born in the 34th week, which is pretty good,&8221; Gutter said. &8220;They came at 2, 2:01 and 2:02 p.m. I had gone to the hospital at 10 o&8217;clock that morning.&8221;

Dr. Tom Carey Jr., the obstetrician who cared for the mother-to-be and who delivered the triplets along with his associate Dr. Donielle Daigle at Natchez Regional Medical Center, said he delivered triplets as a resident in training but not in the 13 years he has been practicing in Natchez.

&8220;It&8217;s a pretty rare thing, about one in 8,000 births,&8221; Carey said. These triplets are all the more special because they were natural triplets, not the result of a fertility program.

Carey said Gutter is to be commended for taking care of herself, resting during the final weeks as recommended and overcoming some other issues that could have presented problems for her during pregnancy.

&8220;She had wonderful support from her mother, who worked in labor and delivery for years,&8221; he said.

Gutter said five months into the pregnancy she &8220;came out of the shock. I searched Web sites, and that helped. And a lady in my church has a niece in New Orleans with triplets. I talked to her to get some ideas.&8221;

Most thrilling for her was the call from Catholic Charities. &8220;They gave us a baby shower,&8221; she said.

&8220;It was just beautiful. People from St. Mary (Basilica), children from Cathedral School &8212; they took up collections to buy things for us,&8221; Gutter said.

&8220;Teenage boys came out to see what they could do for us. They painted and cut grass. They said, &8216;just give us a call when you need some help.&8217;&8221;

Two babies were in incubators for a week and a half before they came home, Gutter said.

Grandmother was quick to add, &8220;But they didn&8217;t need oxygen or anything.&8221;

Gutter has been keenly aware of the importance of involving 10-year-old Alec in caring for the babies.

&8220;I like to feed them,&8221; Alec said, acting shy as his mother bragged about his good grades at McLaurin School, where he is in fourth grade.

Her work at Head Start has taken her into many homes of small children, and she has learned lessons about parenthood from that, Gutter said.

&8220;I know the value of parenthood, the importance of giving children a good foundation,&8221; she said. &8220;Kids are so innocent. If we don&8217;t give them that foundation, they won&8217;t get it.&8221;

Slim and pretty, Gutter wears her motherhood well. She gained 50 pounds while pregnant with the triplets but already is back to her normal size.

&8220;I&8217;m going to take it one day at a time,&8221; she said. &8220;Right now, I&8217;m going to devote all my energy to my family. I would never have believed this.&8221;