When Celia Robbins’ 14-year-old daughter asked if she had any regrets in life, she didn’t get deep about her past life choices.
Instead, the first thing that came to mind was not purchasing a knitted sweater with puffins during a trip to Iceland years ago. The mother of four and freelance writer decided to share the regret on X — and what happened next was simply serendipitous.
“My daughter asked, ‘Do you ever have any regrets, Mom?’ And while I know she was asking this question on a philosophical level, my mind immediately went to this puffin sweater I saw in Iceland,” Robbins tweeted on June 2, alongside a photo of the sweater. “It’s been 3 years since I saw it in a shop there, & I still regret not buying it.”
Robbins then received a reply from Dave Wiskus, CEO of Nebula, saying, “My regret is that I bought this exact sweater for my wife two years ago. She has worn it zero times. I’m in NYC. Cover shipping and it’s yours.”
Robbins asked Wiskus if he was serious, to which he comically replied, “I would never joke about a puffin sweater.”
Ten days later, on June 12, she would go on X to share that the coveted puffin sweater was now in her possession after Wiskus shipped it to her.
“People are amazing!” she tweeted. “Just 10 days ago, I shared a thought about one of my regrets in life. Of course, not buying a sweater sounds like a minor regret, but SO MANY could relate! And then @dwiskus made my wish a reality. This sweater made it from NYC to Berlin in record time!”
Robbins, 37, tells TODAY.com that her story is “absolutely crazy.” When her daughter imposed the philosophical question, she thought, laughing, “Nothing I want to talk to you about.”
“I was trying to tell her, like, ‘I don’t really regret that much. Life is pretty great,’” Robbins says. But she couldn’t stop thinking about the sweater that she first saw in 2021 at a small shop in Iceland during a trip with her husband.
She went back to that same store in 2022 with her then-13-year-old daughter and couldn’t find it.
“I was really bummed,” she says, expressing how much she loves the bird and even took a puffin tour on the Westman Islands during that trip.
She says that when she originally saw the sweater, she didn’t buy it because it was pretty pricey at about $250.
When she posted the photo and wrote about her life's regret, she didn't get many replies — at first.
Robbins moved from Ithaca, New York, to Berlin a year ago this week with her four children and husband. She didn't look at her phone until she got out of work and was shocked to see the post had gone viral.
People directed her to Wiskus' comment, and that's when their interaction happened.
Wiskus, on his end, tells TODAY.com he stumbled on Robbins’ tweet by “pure chance.” The New York resident happened to be in Amsterdam for work and was scrolling on X when her tweet popped up on his “for you” section.
“I have that (sweater),” he thought. He responded and went about his day before also noticing the attention his tweet had garnered. “I was sincere. I would happily get rid of that sweater,” he says. “I didn’t realize so many people on the internet would be that excited about it.”
Wiskus had purchased the puffin sweater about two years ago at the same shop for his wife during a work trip to Iceland. It still had the tag on it. When telling his wife that he “gave it away” on X, she was OK with sending it to Robbins, but joked “you’re going to have to take me to Iceland so I can get another sweater.”
He also notes that he has the exact same pink puffin socks that appear on Robbins' original photo of the sweater.
“Pure luck,” he says about having the sweater she wanted. Wiskus ended up covering the shipping costs and expedited the sweater to Robbins in Berlin.
“I didn’t want to wait,” he says about sending her the prized possession.
He says it was great to see people invested in the story and how excited Robbins was about the sweater. “I can’t stress enough, I really thought this was just, like, doing a funny bit with a random stranger on (X) and it’s just turned into this other thing. But the sincerity of it is what I find so charming.”
When Robbins received the package, it was a perfect fit. She also noticed the tag was from the store she first saw it.
“I almost started crying,” she laughs. “I don’t know how else to explain it, but it’s like a tiny little moment where the universe cared about me.”
She says it's the little things in life that make us happy. “And yeah, a puffin sweater (makes me happy). I love puffins. Puffins make me really happy.”
The gift also came at a perfect moment. “I’m living in a new country. We’ve only been in Berlin for like 11 months, and sometimes life is really hard,” she says. “I don’t speak German. I thankfully have a job where I get to speak English, but this was just the universe being like, ‘Hey, I care about you and what you want.’”
Her puffin sweater, she says, is “hanging up in my closet like a sacred thing.”
Wiskus already had a trip to Berlin scheduled later this summer, and the two made plans to meet each other in person. The two still can't wrap their head around the attention they've received, all because of a knitted puffin sweater.
“Who would think people would be so nice about a puffin sweater?” she says. “It just feels so serendipitous that it really is the exact sweater that I wanted.”
Wiskus adds that what makes this story wonderful is that “everyone wants to believe that if they were to make a wish like this, the wish could come true. And seeing that happen, it makes the world a little bit more magical.”
