Stranger reunites Brunswick County woman with treasured wedding video after Goodwill find

LELAND, NC (WWAY) — A Brunswick County woman received an unexpected Mother’s Day gift this week when a stranger helped return a cherished wedding video that once belonged to her late mother.

Ana O’Donnell was reunited with a DVD recording of her wedding on Wednesday, May 13th after Kristen Vallaire discovered it inside a used Sony DVD player she purchased from Goodwill on Tuesday, May 12th.

Vallaire said she was surprised to find the wedding DVD still inside the player when she brought it home. Hoping to identify the couple featured in the video, she turned to Facebook and asked the community for help.

It did not take long for O’Donnell to see the post and recognize the video.

O’Donnell said the DVD player had belonged to her mother, who died last year at the age of 96. She said her mother frequently watched the wedding video because it allowed her to relive memories of family members and loved ones over the years.

“I would have gone to get it soon, you know, at some point and not known that I’d given it away or that my mother had had it,” O’Donnell said. “Cause she would just watch it every day cause that was her way of just seeing all the people. She was 96, so just a lot of people have come and gone in her life in our family. We have a big Portuguese family, and so she would watch that almost every day and just happy — it would make her really happy.”

O’Donnell said getting the DVD back helps preserve her mother’s memory and gives her the chance to pass the video down to future generations of her family.

She said she hopes her children and grandchildren will one day be able to watch the recording and experience a piece of their family history.

Both O’Donnell and Vallaire said the experience highlights the positive power of social media and the willingness of strangers to help one another.