Counting My Blessings

Yesterday when I put the kids in the car to take Boogie to afternoon preschool, I noticed some things out of place. I quickly called Will and asked if had been looking for something in the van. The answer, "no."  As I buckled the kids in, I noticed more and more things out of place and all the little handy compartments were open.  I took a quick peek into the back of the van where I had some buckets of maternity clothes that my SIL loaned me and I noticed that one was opened and rifled through.

Someone had gotten into our van two nights ago and was looking for stuff. Fortunately, we don't keep anything of value in the van so only a couple of children's DVDs were taken. This really shook me up. For one, I think we live in fairly safe neighborhood. We live in a cul-de-sac and I know most of our immediate neighbors.  I make it a point to say hello when I see them and bake them cookies and give them a Christmas card in December.  We are also at the end of the development. You have to walk past several other cul-de-sacs in order to get to us.

Though two years ago on New Year's Day as we were leaving to go to Mass we found one of cars had been taken from the driveway.  Fortunately, we found it on another street. After Hubby had called it in, we decided to go through the neighborhood. We found it and when the police showed up we were able to show them where it was. When Hubby went with the officer to get the car, they happened to drive by another man clad in his pajamas standing in his driveway with a bewildered expression on his face talking on the phone. Apparently he had a better, newer car than ours and they took his instead.  Total bummer.

Anyway, even though I feel violated and a little shook up, I'm counting my blessings:

1. The car wasn't damaged.
2. There was nothing of value in the car (I had had a birthday check for my daughter that had been sitting in the van for weeks that I had just deposited on Monday; I sometimes forget to take the digital camera out of the car when we go to an event. I'm not worried about the camera so much as the memories that are on it. Fortunately, I had remembered to take it in.)
3. They only took two DVDs: Curious George and Finding Nemo.  I guess they didn't like March of the Penguins.
4.  They had inadvertently found the garage door opener, but didn't appear to use it. I looked in the garage and everything is still in the same place, it doesn't look like anything was taken. This is what scares me the most. They might have tried to get into the house.
5. As my sister-in-law pointed out, the van was still there in the morning.

We got by unscathed. However, I was up for about two hours early this morning and it had nothing to do with pregnancy insomnia. I kept listening for sounds around the house that might not belong. But despite feeling violated, I really feel blessed and feel as if God was watching out for us. They can have the DVDs!