Awww, Maria! What a heartwarming story in the end. There are nice peope out there. We had the same kind of thing happen at our last garage sale. We will never do another because it was such a pain and people suck.
First, they were in my garage before I even set anything up. I tried to get them out but they wouldn't listen and later we caught a lady shoving our clothes in the arms of her jacket and taking off.
From a story nerd perspective, you brought in the object of all the pieces naturally throughout the story and it is so fitting for this week!