we got "robbed"

most of you already know about the break in we had this morning.  for those of you who don't, here's how it went down.

5:00am- roll out of bed, brush my teeth, put my shorts and my shoes on

5:10am- head to kitchen, fill up water bottle, mess with fish tank that steve cleaned up last night, and grab cash envelope thingy out of my purse

5:15am-leave for body pump class

6:35am- stop at HyVee for some tofu

6:45am- come home, realize computer is gone, wake steve up.

At that point things get a little blurry for me.  We just stood there in our kitchen trying to figure out what in the HECK happened (even though it was quite obvious) and if it really could have possibly happened to us.  The evidence makes it pretty obvious what happened.  He (ok I know it could be a female too, but we keep slipping and saying "he," so I'll base it on statistics and stick with "he."  no sexism intended...) moved our flower pot, climbed up our deck, wrecked our screen to pop it out, opened our (unlocked, bummer) window, climbed over our sink, left tree seed CRAP all over our kitchen floor bc it was stuck to his feet, walked down the hallway to the bedrooms and realized people were home, went back to kitchen to grab my brand freaking new computer (which I just bought to do photo editing), my purse, and some cash I had left on the counter (probably like 50 bucks), walked over to our dining room, unplugged my external hard drive (HALLELUJAH!!!!)  and put it in some totally random spot in our dining room, moved our big board block thing that goes in our sliding door as an extra precaution, unlocked the back sliding door, put our door block thing outside, and left.

there are a lot of electronics in this house.   they're all pretty crappy, but still...he only took the one computer and my purse and some cash.  we actually feel very blessed for this sort of outcome.

The next part of the morning was total chaos.  we had to tell the kids because there would soon be police officers showing up and we didn't want to freak them out.  So the first police officer comes, and Steve starts showing her around while I (attempt to) get the kids ready for school.  they were freaked out a bit, but also wanted to be in on the action with the police officer, and I was making tofu scramble for the kids' lunches that day.  Part way through I realized that my purse had also been taken, so at that point steve and I switched because it became "my" police report instead of just a household one.  So Steve was finishing the tofu scramble, packing up the kids lunches, signing folders, making sure they all got dressed, etc, welcoming my daycare girl, and managing the chaos while I talked to the police officer, called the bank (they got gas with my card at 6:14 am, which gives us about a 45 minute window that we KNOW it happened in, ugh...) and all the other stuff that comes with having your purse stolen.  Then the crime lab techician or something came over, so that meant TWO police cars outside and TWO people inside, and she was taking pics and dusting for fingerprints, which was sort of cool, except for the fact that it was my house as a crime scene.  :(

Steve got all the kids off to school, so when he got back we had the rest of the morning to go open new bank accounts, and go through all that business which is a HUGE pain in the butt.

and later in the afternoon my friend took the girls for a couple hours so Steve and I could focus and either call or change info online for all the places we pay bills to that are connected to that specific account.  that is a very very long and annoying job.

it was a long and grueling day, and I still haven't gotten the shower that I came home to take at 6:45.  blech.  but so many people have so many other issues.  so many BIGGER issues.  I kept telling myself, out loud, all day, "this is okay. this is not cancer.  this is not divorce.  this is not death.  this is not kidnapping.  this is not SO MANY HORRIBLE THINGS.  we can do this.  this...is easy."

but it's still sort of sinking in I guess.  We got robbed.  and that sucks.  But I'm realizing that it's not the stuff I feel robbed of, it's other things.

We got "robbed" of our sense of security.  That's not something that will easily be built up.  I know that burglaries happen everywhere.  small towns, big towns, small cities, big cities, north omaha and west omaha.  I get that.  but you don't quite understand the feeling of the loss of security until it happens to you.  when it's YOUR house that someone was walking around in.  when it's YOUR kids sleeping in the bedrooms that he obviously peeked in on.  when it's YOUR husband who was finally for one moment (it's been a rough sleep week) sleeping soundly enough that he didn't hear.

Steve got "robbed" of his role as a protector of our family.  that's all I'm going to say about that because I am not a man and don't even totally get it, but I'm pretty sure that's pretty high up there on any man's list of things to be for his family.

We got "robbed" of our hard work!!!  Steve and I both work more than most other people we know.  we work hard for less pay than most people, so it takes us a really long time to save up for something like a computer, or the software that I put on to do my editing, or the cash that was on the counter, ya know?  we work HARD and LONG for the stuff we have in this house.  and someone just robbed us of our hard work and cheated us out of something that we earned.

I know it's just stuff, and trust me, that's not lost on me.  But our current "stuff" isn't recent enough to be a replacement bc the sofware (or whatever it is- Windows Vista and Mac 10.6.8 instead of Windows 7 or Mac 10.7, or soemthing like that.  I don't even know...) don't support my photo editing sofware.  and well, that just sucks.  so I really do sort of "need" the "stuff" even though it's "just stuff" in order to do my work.

We were also "robbed" of sentimental value.  I realize this is going to sound REALLY dumb, but one of the things I'm saddest about is that they took our mouse pad.  When Josiah was a baby and Lillian was, well, a baby too, practically, I took this odd-angled selfie of me cuddling with my two babies, and I ended up LOVING the photo because it was so real life.  I was in a hooded sweatshirt with no makeup and my hair in a ponytail, looking like my every day self.  and my babies were just so cute because they were mine, ya know?  So for Father's Day that year I spent about 6 bucks on a mouse pad for Steve with that picture on it.  and the dumb guy took that mouse pad.  I know he doesn't even want that freaking mouse pad.  why would he take it?  I'm saddest about that.  I know I can get a new one, but it won't have the pen marks all over it from one my sweet angels totally attacked it with a black bic.  and I grew to love those pen marks all over my face I guess because now I'm having a hard time imagining a new mouse pad with the same picture, but no pen marks. :(  He robbed me of that sentimental value, which you just cant replace.

so yeah, I mean, we got robbed.  in so many ways.  but here's the truth of it all.

You cannot rob people of God.  You cannot take God's peace away from someone who is choosing to cling to it.  You cannot steal from us our Refuge and our Fortress.

so we spent the day talking about God's peace.  He's the Prince of peace!  We discussed how God can use bad things to make good things happen, and maybe the good thing was FIVE Hydeens choosing to let GOD win this battle and have FIVE people grow their trust in God when ONE person chose to sin.  We had lots of good talks today about choosing peace, and choosing to let God win.  but as evening fell upon us, that peace was getting a little farther from our sweet kids' minds.

It's kind of tricky to let them feel their very real feelings, but to also encourage them to not allow the fear to hijack their minds.  I'm not even sure how to do it.  all I knew was we had to hear it from God.  We want our kids to know that the Bible is God's clearest and easiest way to "talk" to us, and guess what.  he usually has something to say that we need to hear.

For us it was Psalm 56:3.  When I am afraid I will trust in You.

So easy for the kids, so simple to understand.  But I could tell it wasn't quite enough.  it was recommended to me to read Psalm 91 with them (I LOVE FACEBOOK!!!) so that's what we did.

1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. 2 I will say of the LORD, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." 3 Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence. 4 He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. 5 You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, 6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. 7 A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. 8 You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked. 9 If you make the Most High your dwelling-- even the LORD, who is my refuge-- 10 then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent.11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; 12 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. 13 You will tread upon the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent. 14 "Because he loves me," says the LORD, "I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. 15 He will call upon me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. 16With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation."


I definitely skipped over the "stalking in the darkness" line, I'll admit it. :) But this is the perfect passage to end a fearful day with.  we talked about baby chicks nestling under their mother's wings.  we talked about angels coming and guarding us through the night.  and we talked about how this is like a little message for us from God, telling us just what to do when we're afraid.  

and I'm not saying we did it perfectly, or that it was the magic potion that worked for this time, or anything like that.  I'm jsut saying that I saw God work in their little hearts, and take away the fear.  Josiah sweetly said, "um, mom, I didn't forget about the robber, I just....."  and he told me something TOTALLY random, I don't even remember what it was.  but the fact that I could see him release his fear (which had him in tears moments before) without even releasing the memory of the experience proved to me that God really IS bigger than the boogie man, he's bigger than Godzilla or the monsters on tv. (veggies tales reference for those of you deprived people in the world who don't know bob and larry).  

and he's BIGGER than being robbed.  of stuff, of security, of sentimental value, of hard work, of anything.  so BOOM.  take THAT, robber!  WE WIN!!!!

a few things...

so, it's the middle of April and I haven't blogged once in 2014.  So I guess it's time to get a few things on the ol' internet for all to see.  sometimes I wonder why I do this.  and then random people approach me at random times and tell me that either a) they read my blog, or b) they like reading my blog, which I guess don't necessarily mean the same thing, but it makes me feel like something besides the babysitter/seamstress/mom in me matters.  and it's fun for me to go back and read about my life.  if you know me well, it's no secret that I can NOT remember ANYTHING ever, which makes me look like a really bad friend on many an occasion.  but it's not intentional, promise.  plus it's awesome because I can rewatch Friday Night Lights over and over and over again and recite the lines with them but still wonder how each episode will turn out. it's awesome! :)

ok so anyway, I figured I'll write a few things out again.  just...you know, the recent happenings.  the hydeen happenings.  yep.  I just did that.

1.  so the beginning of the year kinda sucked.  I'm not even exactly sure why, but I was just really sad.  didn't quite feel like myself, laid around a lot, crushed too much candy, cleaned on a rare occasion, and cried more than usual.  I actually think a lot of it was sparked by a book I read which was supposed to teach me about being a great wife for my dear husband, and instead made me feel like the worst wife EVER in the whole entire world and like there was no possible way I could be everything he needed me to be, so I went with the obvious decision and was NOTHING that he needed me to be.  not exactly sure how that made sense in my head but I went with it.  still slowly climbing out of it, if I'm being totally honest. but the good news is that I"m slowly forgetting everything the book said, since that's what I do!  and that probably helps the situation a bit.

2.  or it might be the fact that mini cadbury eggs made their appearance for the year, and that seems to help whatever ails you, right?  now, listen here.  I'm full of self control when it comes to money.  but not so much when it comes to portion control.  So those suckers at Cadbury know how to get someone like me.  I can say "no" to the giant (but actually quite small) purple bag of heavenly chocolate drops, because I"m unwilling to pay 4 bucks for a small bag that I will eat in entirety in one afternoon.  BUT, they have these 69 cent mini bags with just a handfull of them inside, and I let myself buy one every time I see one.  it's small, and cheap, and it's helping with "the sadness."  so I figure I can't go wrong.  right?  RIGHT???

3.  I started doing some indoor photography the last few months.  It started bc I wanted to do my own pinkadink photo shoot, which could also be read that I procrastinate way too much to get prepared for a shoot with another photographer ever again like I did last year.  even though it was AWESOME last year, I thought I could save myself some last minute stress and do it myself.  I liked it, thought the pics turned out pretty cute, and people started asking me to do their baby shoots, etc. so I said I would!  I took a photo editing class last fall, and so I bought some new editing software a couple months ago so I'd know what I'm doing when it comes time to edit the WEDDING pics I'm taking in May.  Yes, I"m doing a wedding.   (what!?!)  but I'm so excited!  so anyway, I was doing all these photo shoots, and ended up pretty happy with the pics in general, and then someone tried to print them and they were SO HORRIBLE. I thought surely it was just a problem with how they were saved or something bc the digital versions looked way way way better. anyway, I tried for like 3 or 4 weeks to figure out the problem.  I stressed out so much over these darn pictures.  I spent hours and hours and hours trying to figure it out.  I asked 3 other photographers to see if they could help me figure it out.  LONG STORY SHORT: Sara Crane is my hero.  I was just whining to her one day about the problem, and how much stress it was causing me, and she googled the problem, gave me a link, I followed these totally random directions for doing who knows what, and changed a setting that the software came with, and it worked.  ba-da-bing.  easy as pie.  I cried happy tears and then got raging mad that I spent hours in the software "help" section when all along I should have just used GOOGLE.  I google things about 700 times a day, but didn't ever google that problem, since I thought I'd find the answer in the actual help tab.  sooooo anyway, here's a little glimpse of the cuties I've been shooting. :)  and here's the link to my facebook page if you want to check it out:
 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Studio-H/1347534618719184

4.  another new thing in recent months is that we joined the YMCA and I'm doing body pump twice a week.  It's not nearly as fun as when I did a trial class with my sisters over Christmas, but it does feel good to feel stronger.  I could barely move the first week, got stuck when I tried to pee, and felt like I had weighted shoulder pads in every shirt for about 2 weeks straight.  but now I'm getting strong, and I even did a couple pushups on my TOES last week, which is major.  The only problem?  I'm gaining weight.  so I decided to try and measure inches lost instead, hoping that would boost my spirits.  and, um, well, let's just say....see #2 of this post. :(  

5.  and I'm not the only one eating candy around here either.  The kids' bus driver gave them each a bag full of candy a couple weeks ago.  yes, this would be the same bus driver I had a little chit chat with a while back about slamming on the brakes when the kids were doing something out of line, even if it meant just having their foot in the aisle.  I HATE confrontation and it was a huge deal for me to climb up on that bus and talk to her about my concern, but I put my big girl pants on and TOTALLY humiliated my kids, but it had to be done.  and now she's totally kissing my butt by giving out candy bags and friendly honking at me when she drives off after the kids get off the bus.  and I'm like 'whatever, lady!  just don't slam on your freaking breaks with kids inside!'  

6.  daycare is winding down.  I have had a variety of daycare situations over the last 5 years, but Maddie (that cutie in the b/w pic up there) has been with me for 4 of them.  That girl is as close to my own kid as you can get.  But I always said that I wanted to stay home with MY kids (which is why I did daycare instead of teaching) and not necessarily OTHER people's kids, and Brielle is going to kindergarten next year, so it's time to be done.  I'm now spending my days half-dreading and half-desiring the days in the future when I can just, like, do whatever I want whenever I want.  sorta.  it's like the dream from when you were a kid and you thought that's what adulthood would be like, and then it doesn't turn out that way, but then all the sudden all your kids are in school and it sorta DOES turn out that way.  except for the fact that you have to figure out how to pay the bills (that's the half-dreading part), which leads me to my new job.

7.  I've started sewing princess inspired fleece hoodies for a lady here in Omaha who can't keep up with her etsy shop.  she has EIGHT seamstresses and we'll be super busy from Aug through Dec because apparently there are a lot of people willing to pay over $100 for a hoodie for their little girl.  I'm certainly not one of them, but just in case you are, then you should check out this shop!!! http://www.etsy.com/shop/MagicPrincessWhitney?ref=l2-shopheader-name  I'll be trained in Rapunzel, Snow White, Anna, Elsa, and the my little pony ones.   so that will keep me super busy and give me lots of time to work on my posture since I am convinced I'll be a hunchback in a couple years if I continue to sew the way I do.  so, posture practice it is!  I'm not totally sure what will happen with the pinkadink during those months.  I'll probably see if I can do both for a while, but if it gets to be too much I'll have to close the shop for a bit while I work on making the big bucks. :)  for those of you who think my pinkaink stuff is overpriced, well, I BARELY make a profit off it so I gotta do what I gotta do for my family now, so hoodies will have to take priority.  kinda sad, huh?  but I am really excited for it too.  We just got our taxes done for the year and I was reminded once again that nobody else in the whole world would work as much as I do for the pinkadink and get paid what I get paid for doing it.  so... I"m trying to figure out what to do with that information, once again. and this gives me a chance to still sew cute stuff and get paid pretty good to do it.

ok, it's time for me to make taco soup.  the kids are not impressed with the idea, and they are quite tired of me trying out new recipes.  I'm actually considering starting a new blog where I just post aobut stuff I"m doing around my house, not necessarily personal stuff like I do here.  and recipes would definitely be a part of that since people ALWAYS ask me what we eat. and like craft projects or DIY things that I've always wanted to do and would feel inspired if i was going to blog about it.  but I don't know, would anybody even read that???  hard to know.  

alright, in the words of Paco, and in honor of being TEN YEARS past our semester in Spain next month, "paz afuera."  

which is a really horrible gringo translation of "peace out."