Annual yard sale funds random acts of kindness in Virginia community

From buying homecoming dresses to supplying nurses with boxes of donuts, Susan Thompson-Gaines stays busy by doing at least one good deed a day.

The Arlington, Virginia, resident collects her neighbors' old clothes, toys, jewelry, housewares, and other odds and ends, and once a year, holds a massive yard sale, using the profits to fund random acts of kindness in the community — her 2021 event raised more than $12,000. "So many people helped," she told CBS News. "It's everyone in the community now."

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.