Joy of Christmas

After weeks of Christmas shopping for more than 200 area families, Friday was Brian Knudson’s time for “power shopping” for his own family.

Knudson is founder of Children’s Christmas Benefit, which this year raised about $6,000 to provide gift packages to Rock County families.

But on Friday, while Knudson was paying for his own family’s gifts at the Janesville Mall, thieves took off with all his presents.

“I was planning on getting all my shopping done in one night, so I was really going to town to try and get it all done,” Knudson said.

Knudson, a Rock County Board supervisor from Brodhead, had spent about $500.

At a Boston Store checkout, he didn’t notice someone grab all of his bags-filled with clothes, jewelry, candy and tools-that had been sitting on the floor beside him.

“They were pretty sly about it because I still can’t believe it. I didn’t see it or notice it,” he said.

His gifts were gone, but on Christmas morning a phone call from a Janesville woman restored Knudson’s faith in kindness. A couple hours later, he was picking up about $200 worth of the stolen presents.

Wendy Zanoni and her family had been at the Janesville Mall on Friday, too, and later were hauling presents from her mother’s rental car when they noticed a bag with unwrapped Sears tools.

From what Zanoni and Knudson can conclude, the thieves got spooked as they ran from Boston Store with Knudson’s stolen gifts. They suspect the thieves dumped the heavy bag of tools into the backseat of the Zanoni car, which was unlocked and parked outside Boston Store.

Zanoni and her family initially laughed about the idea that someone had put the items in the wrong car. But regardless of the reason, they wanted to get them back to the owner.

Knudson had paid cash for all of his items and left the receipts in each bag. But because he works at Sears, Knudson had used his employee discount when buying the tools. His name was printed on the bottom of the receipt.

Zanoni searched the phonebook and called Knudson about five times Christmas Eve simply because “it was the right thing to do,” she said.

“She wouldn’t have had to do that,” said Knudson’s mother, Kay. “It just made our whole Christmas to know that there’s someone that good out there, because it really takes the wind out of your sails when something like that happens.”

Despite losing $300 worth of gifts, Knudson said Zanoni’s actions were a great Christmas present.

“It was just unbelievable … to know that there’s people that are honest all the way through,” he said. “It’s a wonderful feeling. (Wendy) is just a super, super nice person.”

Knudson was lucky to find all the same presents Saturday when he returned to the mall to buy new ones, he said.

Friday night, he joked with the clerks, was just practice.

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