In the midst of tragedy, one Jefferson City family has been reunited with pictures they thought were gone forever.
Brenda Engelbrecht and her husband had a storage unit at Donnie Braun and Sons Storage off U.S. 54 filled with family pictures of their travels, of their children when they were young and of their grandchildren.
When the May 22 tornado hit Jefferson City, many of the pictures were blown away in the wind. The storage facility was heavily damaged.
This wasn't the first time the Engelbrecht family had lost pictures of all their family memories.
"We lost a lot of our pictures 21 years ago in a house fire," Engelbrecht said. "So when this happened, it was like, 'Oh my gosh, it just took us that long to get memories back together, and then it happens once again.'"
After the fire, Engelbrecht scanned the pictures on to CDs. Unfortunately, the discs were in the storage unit and blown away. They have not yet been found.
Engelbrecht said her mother's house had been hit by the tornado, so she didn't even realize her pictures were gone until later the next afternoon.
"We were kind of going through the motions and thinking, 'This is what we need to do,' and didn't even think about our storage center being hit," Engelbrecht said.
When they got to the storage center, they found part of it blown away and damage to other things like construction tools and holiday decorations.
Engelbrecht said she was blessed to find two pictures of her father, who is deceased, but the rest were gone.
"It's heartbreaking because family is everything to me," Engelbrecht said. "You can always make new memories and take new pictures, but you can't relive the past."
Engelbrecht liked having the pictures so she could pass them down to her grandchildren. She lost 10-12 albums along with totes she had for each child.
But then a miracle happened.
Engelbrecht had seen on Facebook that people had been finding pictures scattered around the highway and turning them in to the Missouri River Regional Library's lost and found for items found while cleaning up after the tornado and recent flooding.
She called, and library staff told her they had some of her pictures.
"I was relieved," Engelbrecht said. "It was a heartfelt relief."
The library wasn't the only place that had some of her pictures.
Someone posted a picture of a baby on Facebook, and a friend of Engelbrecht's family recognized the baby as her son, Isaac, who is now 37.
Someone else recognized a picture of Engelbrecht's daughters and grandson on Facebook and brought it to her workplace.
"It was amazing to have these people recognize pictures from even a long time ago and get them back to us," she said.
Engelbrecht said she is overwhelmed with gratitude.
"That's what blows my mind; people are respecting that this is someone's memory and taking the time to turn it in when they could have easily just tossed it in the trash can and went on, but they didn't," she said.
The library still has two pictures, some baseball cards, an oil painting and a pair of glasses in its lost and found.
Any other sentimental items found can be turned in at the library, 214 Adams St. in Jefferson City. People looking for lost items can stop by the library or call 573-634-6064.
Engelbrecht hopes more of her stuff is turned in.
"I am hoping that I get some more back; but if I don't, I'm just thankful that I have some," she said. "I'm just going to go on and make new memories."