My world gets its perspective sharpened

If you've read the previous post, you know that our granddaughter, while not scheduled to appear until mid-May, was threatening to launch herself more quickly. Well, launch she did, beginning Wednesday night and appearing on Thursday morning. At 34 weeks, she's a little early for everyone's comfort and at a bit over 4 1/2 pounds, she is now in the neonatal intensive care unit at her birth hospital. She is breathing on her own (whew! no incubator!) but she isn't eating, as those reflexes hadn't been seen to in the womb yet.

So, while Mommy is exhausted and Daddy is finally figuring out that life has changed, Emily Elizabeth is giving all of us pause. It's just a speed bump in her long wonderful life, I keep telling myself. Just a speed bump. She'll learn to eat--she has the oftentimes larger-than-life ancestors to attest to the fact that we all do. But until then, our perspective is focused on a little bed and a little inhabitant, her limbs and torso covered with sensors, all making sure they have the right perspective on our baby.