2 B.C. kids lost their new Christmas bikes on New Year's Day. The community chipped in to replace them

Dawn Jones celebrated the first day of the new year with her husband walking the popular hiking path toward awaterfall near the Pentictonwater treatment plant.

That's when the couple noticed a pair of distraught young parents looking for two brand new bikes they had purchased for their kids as Christmas gifts. The bikes had vanished within five minutes of being left unattended.

"We were looking at these little sad faces, and they didn't understand where their bikes went," said Jones, a 49-year-old grandmother of two toddlers herself.

Lana and Marcus Lebler told Jones they believed the bikes were stolen when they took their children, Ash, 4, and Nya, 2, to view the waterfall.

While the Leblers filed a police report, Jones promised to ask around on Facebook to see whether the missing bikes were beingresold online.

"If anyone sees the bikes for sale anywhere, let me know, and I'll send them a message. Who knows, maybe we can prove there is still goodness in Penticton," wrote Jones in her Jan. 1 post on a local community Facebook page.

'Outpouring of kindness'

Jones says the Leblers didn't ask for help themselves and could have afforded to replace the bikes with their own moneybut within a single dayshe experienced what she described as an "outpouring of kindness that came from nowhere" strangers who saw her message said they wanted to help replace the bikes.

After discussing it with the Leblers, Jones went to a hardware storeto buy two bikes similar tothe onesthe kids had owned. She received a total of$240 from seven people.

Marcus Lebler visited Jones Saturday afternoon with his kids to pick up the new bikes.

"We were not expecting new bikes for the kids the very next day, but that's exactly what happened," the Leblers said in a written statement to CBC News. "My kids have been riding the bikes around the house all evening."

Even more surprising to the Leblers was that on Sunday, Jones received a Facebook message that says the two missing bikes were turned in to RCMP.

Now, the Leblers say they're willing to donatethe new bikes that Jonespurchased to a needy family.

"It was a great lesson in the goodness of the human spirit for my children, and hopefully, we get a chance to pay this forward someday soon," they wrote.