Sorry this is likely to be long. First time posting in AIBU but prepared to be told IABU, and I know I was partly. Anyway, went on holiday and asked friend and neighbour to feed the cats. Came back to find she had taken it upon herself to clean and tidy our house, enlisting the help of a couple of friends. All sounds good until we discovered three bags of DS toys (none of which were broken, and included 2 week old birthday presents) in the bin. We then found further toys and other stuff e.g. the blade from my food processor, instruction manuals to the oven, washing machine etc scattered throughout the bin (this required several searches through the bin which was full of maggots - really grim job!). We also had search through the house to find our paperwork, toys etc. At the end of which we had retrieved approx £200 worth of stuff in the bin (some of it was bits from toys etc but that would be the replacement cost) but a further £100 of missing items including the remote to DS birthday present, and his favourite jigsaw.
This is where I was a bit unreasonable as I emailed my friend, mainly so I could set out exactly what was missing, how much it cost and that I expected it to be paid for without getting all upset and emotional and the message being lost. I just emailed my friend who had the key as she organised it but left to discuss with the others (although I suspect and she says she didn't, personally throw anything away, the other two clearly did). She and one of the others has gone completely mad denying throwing anything out, that we obviously just haven't found it yet (we have already been through the whole house and it's definitely not here), telling me they just wanted to make room for the kids to play (we have baby twins and a toddler) and that the toys they had abandoned to the elements in the garden clearly weren't being played with (this is nonsense). Yes our house is rather untidy, not easy keeping on top of it with 3 young children, but there is still room to play and ultimately it is our house, we didn't ask them to do it, and I don't see why I should have to justify our lifestyle or housekeeping habits to anyone else as it's none of their business. I've been left feeling judged and betrayed by my friend but she is acting like I should be grateful (for losing £100 of our belongings!) and that she is the injured party. She was coming with me to a baby activity which requires 1:1 with the twins but has now pulled out so that will be £200 wasted unless I can swap it to the weekend, and leaves a rather empty week as I only have 2 other activities (I am on maternity leave) and don't know of any other activities where I can go with 2 babies. It feels like she's punishing the twins for this, and all we asked her to do was look after our cats. I wish we had never asked her.
Anyway if you have got to the end accepting that I should have spoken to her rather than emailed am I being unreasonable to be upset by this and be asking her to pay or should I just suck up the losses and apologise as she seems to think I should? Would be grateful for other views on this.
Just to add and so as not to drip feed, she has helped a lot with babysitting particularly since the twins arrived which obviously would have cost us if we had to pay someone (she is now chucking that back in my face too but does that really make it OK for us to have lost all our things?)