Ontario mother honours son and 31 other children in P.E.I.

Cindy Quick's son Michael may not have ever been to P.E.I., but now there is a little piece of him there forever.

Cindy Quick and her husband Darcy, from Leamington, Ont.,visited theInternational Children's Memorial in Freetown, P.E.I.,in late August for atree-planting ceremony, and to see the memorial they created for Michael and 31 other children.

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Families who have lost children can purchase bricks by donation to be engraved and installed along a pathway at the memorial site.

With the addition of some bricks with special messages, the Quicksorganized for 37 bricks in total to be laid.

Cindy lost her son, MichaelAscottonNovember 28, 2014. He was 29 years oldat the time.

'It took my breath away'

The Quicks also got the members of their bereavement group involved.

"We had mentioned it there and before you know it, it had snowballed...It was word of mouth spreading to people that they know, that we really didn't know, and it kind of went that way."

When the Quicks arrived at the Memorial Place, the bricks had been laid. Cindy said it was an overwhelming experience.

"This huge, huge block of all these names, it was just, when I walked up, it took my breath away."

"...Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be travelling across Canada to do something like this, and here I am, I'm here in P.E.I. laying a brick in memory for him, and it was just a little bit overwhelming."

Cindy said the organizers told her it was the largest grouping of bricks they had seen.

'All our kids are going to be together'

Cindy said the response from the other parents was very touching.

"People were just amazed that we did it for one thing. It was 5,022 kilometre round trip for us and we drove, it was 56 hours in the car."

"It's bittersweet... I was really touched that everyone came forward and I figured there would be a few people that would you know say 'yeah that sounds like a good idea' and then we got an overwhelming response.But the people just... they were in awe of it. They just thought it was incredible that we offered that to them and you know all our kids are going to be together."

Cindy said Michael was a traveller so he would have loved this memorial.

"Just driving out thereto do it... I think my son would be very proud that now a piece of him is in another part of Canada. He was a true Canadian, very proud Canadian

He was a beautiful soul,just a beautiful soul."

Planted tree in honour

Before the Quickswent to the Memorial Place, they spent Saturday night at Victoria Park in Charlottetown watching the live showing of the Tragically Hip concert.

"My son was a musician and he played a lot of their music, that was really moving.It was a little bit hard for me, it was a good thing it was dark cause I went to pieces a few times, especially hearing the music that he always played."

The Quicks also purchased a tree in Michael's honour, and will be coming back to P.E.I. in June 2017for the dedication service.

"I was very, very happy to do it and happy to do it for everybody and bring the pictures back and show them and tell them that if they ever have the opportunity to go out, not only to go to the International Children's Place but just to go to the Island and see another part of Canada that you don't see down here, by all means do it."

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