When You Are Robbed, Your First Thought Is…

The kids are okay.

(The kids are more than fine actually, they are busy watching the rest of their movie from the long drive, they don’t notice anything.)

I have my wedding ring on.

The house was still standing (I always envision driving up after being away and the house just a puddle of ash – who would call? How would the fire department know how to get ahold of me if the house burned down? Yes, just an example of the weird thoughts that go through my head.)

The absolutely WORST thing robbers could take would be…. my thought was immediately my laptop (my precious!) but that thing goes everywhere with me! It was safe and sound, strapped into the passenger seat in my car. (I’m just kidding. It wasn’t strapped in.)

The rest of it, eh. My pictures are all backed up online. The TVs are expensive but they are just equipment. I feel like I need to have an online backup rather than just a hard drive backup. Something to think about! Well, that… and an alarm system.

The good news is that the Orange County Sheriff’s department absolutely rocks! You heard all those complaints when Yorba Linda switched from the Brea Police over to the Sheriff’s Department. The officer arrived within minutes and the follow-up group who came to fingerprint and DNA everything touched came within another hour.

Basically, all my jewelry is gone, my husband’s Laker jacket (they must be fans), and my body pillow-CASE. Yes, my pillow CASE. That body pillow got me through two pregnancies and I STILL use that thing to sleep and they touched it, took the PILLOW case off of it… and used it to destroy my jewelry box by STEALING the drawers and swiping everything that was on top. Oh, they missed a bracelet (that fell near the trash) and one back of an earring.

At least they were recycling, I guess? Reuse and repurpose pillow cases! Why use a plastic trash bag when you can grab a close pillow case? (The recycling joke was the husband’s, btw. Have to give credit!)

I joke, I guess I get to go jewelry shopping? But all my pieces were sentimental… Great-grandma’s diamond ring that went to the oldest grandchild… some of my Mother’s stuff. Every single piece my husband has given me over the years for various anniversaries, valentine’s days, and Christmas’s. A handmade ring that my late Grandma Juanita made. Special things that my friends had given me from celebrating weddings with them.

The better news is that the kids have NO idea what is going on. I was tempted to tell them the truth but we went with the rose-colored version of “Mommy was paranoid that someone came in our house because the door was open. However, it may have been the wind. Yet, these nice police officers are examining the whole house so we can feel safe. Aren’t they nice?”

Hey, they bought it. And Sam said she was SO happy that no one has been in our house because if someone took piggy (her stuffed animal) she would be so so so very sad because Piggy is in her heart.

True words.

And they keep their innocence another day. After Sandy Hook, I was happy they were oblivious. I am happy they are oblivious now too. Before they came in the house, we closed all the doors that were opened and ransacked… and made sure they didn’t go in our bedroom to see the worst of it. We couldn’t touch that stuff actually since they had to fingerprint it, etc.

SO… what happened? We came home from a weekend trip to Big Bear. We were doing some major renovations to the house so we had taken two cars. I was about 20 minutes ahead of the husband. I pulled in the garage, the kids wanted to watch the VERY LAST BIT of their movies, so I grabbed the dog… almost lost her because I didn’t put the leash on (oops, hopefully the husband isn’t reading this!), and then dragged her with me to the garage door. I went to open it and the handle was locked. Which was weird. I never lock the door and when we go out of town, usually hubby locks the deadbolt.

So it was locked… but as I leaned on it, it opened. Hubby would NEVER do that. Hubby is crazy Type A anal with things (I love you, honey) and always makes sure doors are shut. Locked door, but not closed? Nope. So I think I UNLOCKED the door at that point because I didn’t want to lock myself out and I start to walk through our laundry room to let the dog out and what do I see?

The door wide open.

With the doggy door panels lying on the ground. At that point, I ‘think’ I heard a noise. Hello, paranoid evil thoughts and adrenalin speeding through me.

I go straight back out. The kids are still in the car. I think at that point, I try to get the dog to pee on the bushes but she wouldn’t go, so I throw her butt straight back in her crate, hop back in the car and pull out on the street. I keep the car running.

Because you never know when a madman with a chainsaw will come running out and you will need to gun that car straight down the street.

I argue with the  kids to sit back in their car seats and strap back in. Why? Just because we are in the car, darn it. Just do it. Here, have your iPads back. Watch another movie.

Why aren’t we going in? Oh, Mommy just saw an open door and wants to wait for Papa.

I call the husband. No answer. Actually just voice mail. Call again. Darn it. Is he down the hill yet? Why is it going to voice mail?

Debate, debate, debate. Police? 911? I don’t want to tie up the line. I should probably call the regular number. What is that number?

I call my Mother in law instead. I knew my Mom was driving out to visit another relative.

Luckily, she answers and I ask her my hypothetical question of ‘Should I wait for Justin to answer his phone or should I call the police?’. Sam’s ears perk up at that. MIL says she is driving right over with FIL instead. Okay, awesome.

I definitely need a buddy, preferably with a baseball bat to walk the house. Plus someone to watch over the kids. Cause you know that madman with the chainsaw is going to run out the OTHER door, steal the car with the kids in it, and take off while we are searching inside. Hmm, who should watch the kids? I will worry about that later.

Hubby finally answers and we have a nice long discussion of what could possibly be gone. Am I brave enough to walk up to the front door and peer inside?

Nope. Not yet.

Father in law calls to tell me he is on his way with his advice of calling the police right away. Knowing that three people would be there within 10 minutes made me brave enough to peer inside… Everything looked okay. Stuff was still hanging on the walls. I figured I would wait.

Everyone arrived quickly. We walked inside and saw many of the cabinet doors were opened and riffled through. We called the police once we were sure we were robbed.

So many people have experienced being robbed. You know what it’s like. The violated feeling. The creepy crawly feeling of people handling your stuff.

It appears it was a super quick job. They missed so many OBVIOUS things. My camera was sitting out in plain site. My passport, eek. They went through every clothing drawer and all the drawers next to our bed. What made me laugh was that they went through all of our iPhone boxes. They were empty though. We just like to keep the boxes!

Who Done Did It? 

One of the first thoughts that runs through my head is I have to be more private. I do take privacy seriously. I protect my address. My Facebook is locked down pretty tightly to who I actually know in person… and I am careful at what I post publicly vs friends-only. However, duh, nothing is ever private.

I was wracking my brain thinking what I posted on Facebook vs something open like Twitter or Instagram. I did post things ‘friends-only’ about being up in Big Bear… how coyotes were trying to eat my dog at 7:15am on Saturday. I posted a picture of Sam and I skiing that went out on Instagram that was public and it went to Twitter as well. (Which is open and anyone can follow me.)

Was it that? The odds are high that it was someone who knew us. We have a bunch of rowdy neighbors though… young kids who like to party. They haven’t been as bad as they used to be but when we pack our car, it’s usually pretty apparent. Our house is close to the riverbed and there are a lot of homeless people that come up and stay at the park down our street.

On the other hand, Yorba Linda has been really attacked lately by these very similar home robberies. Their was a group of 4 people who got a ton of houses last month but they were caught. The officer said this is really similar, in how they go straight for the master bedroom and jewelry. It looked very amateur though since they didn’t bother taking so many easy things!

Either way… I should be more careful. Taking the fun and joy out of my social media spontaneity. Or really, just making me SUPER more private and sticking to chatting in my Facebook ‘secret’ groups that don’t show any of my comments on the news feeds, or the creepy ‘everything’ stalker box on the top right.

We also need to invest in an alarm, a nice safe, maybe some automatic lights that pop on and off in the house, a dog barking recording whenever someone rings the doorbell, and new doors to get rid of that STUPID doggy door where they busted and climbed in.

Maybe only some of those things. 🙂

Oh joy. Well, I suppose we better get started.

I have to say though… we are so lucky! Everyone is here, fine, and our house is still standing… just some incidentals (while very sad) are easy to replace.

Stay safe!