A playset was stolen from a little girl in Pocatello. How others have shown kindness.

POCATELLO — An outdoor playset was stolen from a mother’s front yard in Pocatello, and it wasn’t just any plastic slide. It belonged to her daughter, who has spina bifida.

Erica Klein lives in Pocatello with her 7-year-old daughter, Sloane and her 12-year-old son, Gage. Sloane was born with spina bifida, which is a condition that occurs when the spine and spinal cord don’t form properly, according to the Mayo Clinic. It can affect walking and mobility.

Sloane is a part-time wheelchair user and has arm crutches. She has had several surgeries on her legs and has traveled to Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah, often.

“Over the years, my daughter has thrived and grown. She’s amazing,” said Klein. “I always tell people she’s my hero because the amount of perseverance that this little girl has… she has a lot to teach me as her mom.”

Sloane is happy and friendly. She wants others around her to feel included. Neighborhood kids like to play and spend time with her whenever she is outside on her giant plastic slide. She’s had it since she was 2 years old.

“It’s the one thing she had consistently that she loved to play on,” Klein said.

On Jan. 31, Klein said the weather had been warming up, so she and her daughter decided to go outside and play. However, the playset was gone.

“I was like, ‘Wait. What is happening right now? I’m so confused,’” Klein said. “I get on my Ring camera to see if I can check what happened. Well, at 7:30 a.m., the playset was in my yard, and then, for some reason, my camera was frozen all day long. So it was there one second, and then it’s gone.”

She checked in with neighbors, but their cameras weren’t working during the same time either. Klein posted on social media to see if anyone had seen it and asked that it be returned because it affected her daughter.

Sloane has been asking if it’s been found.

Tiffany Dansie, a friend of Klein’s, learned what had happened. “It was a safe space where she could laugh, grow and build confidence,” Dansie wrote online.

“We need to have more awareness. Don’t steal. What might seem small to us is actually huge to others like Sloane. I think what’s upsetting to me is that, for one, somebody stole from them. For two, they stole from a little kid but then, three, they stole from a handicapped child. That is the one toy that she could play with outside. She doesn’t have other options,” Dansie said.

Dansie has spent a lot of time around Sloane. She said she’s bright and really fun to be around.

“To know Sloane is to love Sloane. You just fall in love with her. She’s so happy, and she’s silly, she’s fun, and she’s loving,” Dansie said. “She just has a great personality.”

Dansie came up with the idea to create a GoFundMe to gift Sloane a more adaptive playset with a bigger slide and swing. She hopes she can use it for many years. She’d like not only to get a new playset for Sloane, but also a wagon so Klein can put her daughter in it and take her on walks.

If there is any leftover money, Dansie said she would like to donate it to a spina bifida charity or Primary Children’s Hospital. As of Thursday evening, $225 has been raised out of a $1,000 goal.

Dansie had asked Klein if she could create the GoFundMe. Klein was left speechless. She never requested one because she isn’t one to ask for help. She said it was initiated by someone who cared.

What started as property theft became more about kindness toward others.

“I am just a single mom. As much as I feel like you want help, you never want anyone else to feel like taking the burden of your own stuff, so when she did it, I was emotional. I just felt like it was so kind because it wasn’t what I was expecting,” Klein said. “When I look at it from the flipped side of a coin, it’s something that I probably would have wanted to do for somebody else, too. It was really nice.”

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