B&E turned Birthday

Something really cool happened to our family this week. Our laptop came back.
I've got to preface this entry with a bit of background information. A few Tuesdays ago, maybe 3, I pulled into my driveway and noticed my dog standing on my front porch. In my head, I thought about how unusual this was for 2 reasons...1) I normally dont leave Kidd outside when I am not home, and 2) I vividly remember having to drag his old hind into the house b/c it was so stinkin' hot. Not thinking much of this at the time, I leave the kids in the car while I grab all of our junk, unlock the door and then head back out to help them out of carseats and inside. As I'm pushing the door open, it takes about 30 seconds for me to realize someone has broken into our house. The glass from the back door has been shattered and is all over the family room and the TV is gone. This is all I notice or care to notice as I turn around get back into my car, and call the police. Lots more unfolds, but for time sake I'll spare all the details. The cops and my hubby take care of all the nity gritty while I retreat to a friends house down the street to spare the children all the destruction to the house. After a long afternoon, I come home to find things turned upside down literally. Movie style unbelieveable. The only rooms not taken apart drawer by drawer, cabnet by cabnet, were the kids rooms. Every single item in my house sifted through, turned over, taken, or thrown on the floor. It was hard to see. Through it all though, Jamie and I felt this sense of peace. I know that sounds "Yea, right" but it is true. We weren't scared, didn't feel violated (although we did wash a ton of sheets, underwear, bathing suits.....) we just walked from room to room cleaning as much as we could so that our kids wouldn't know or sense anythng bad had happened. Occasionally, Jamie and I would hug, ask one another if he/she was okay, then be on to the next task. In all, we recognized that all we had lost was "stuff." Our family was safe and we could have cared less about anything else. Except, our laptop. One of the first things Jamie said to me when the police arrived and were searching the house was "We've just lost all of our pictures." They even took our hard drive that had the backups to our pictures. The videos of each childs birth. First days of school, first steps, first feedings, and the list goes on. So we really mourned this aspect of the robbery. We had hope though. We believed that we might get our pictures back, as far fetched as it seemed, we did think we might. A week or so goes by our hope dwindles a tad, we visit Costco and some other stores pricing laptops and cameras, video recorders, new televisions. We go on vacation and come back to find a card on our door from the police officer who was on our case. He says they have found the couple who broke into our home and they think they have recovered our LAPTOP! The one with all the pictures. Indeed they had. Jamie walks in the front door, home from work, not having said a word about having my laptop in his possession, with the birth of Riley playing on the screen. Prayers answered????? You bet. We sat together watching all the videos of the day our kids were born, silly pics of each one of them. The pictures you dont send to anyone, but cherish more than you can imagine. And we're so thankful. A little wowed too. Wowed that our cries were met with the goodness of trusting in our hope. This laptop has been my little reminder of that. Really pretty cool.

Although our camera is gone, the day before the break in, I uploaded the pictures from George's 3rd birthday. I am so glad about that. Upon request we spent the day at the beach with friends and family. We played in the surf, ate pizza and chocolate covered pretzels. Here are a few pics.

His new crocs.

The number 3 pinata.

After pizza and chocolate covered pretzels. Upon request of course.