As Devin moved on to the next phase of his life, the one thing that was consistent with him was that you could see how old of a soul he had.

I remember the one day at home when his dad was getting ready to go to work and Devin got so upset. He just could not understand why, at 6, he was not allowed to get a job. He wanted to go to work like he seen his dad doing. He wanted to earn an income. No matter how much I tried to explain to him that it was because of his age, he really did not want to accept that but had no option. He told me from that day forward that the minute he turned twelve he was going to get a job.

Every year at school, Devin had the same parent teacher interviews. He was an amazing young man. All the teachers loved him. He was so respectful of all the teachers. He was pretty much a straight A student. They wished all their students were as easy as Devin was.

Devin also looked forward to our annual family trips. I think he was the one that came up with calling them the Seguin adventures versus the summer holidays. Every year we would pack up and head out on a trip. The only thing we knew for sure was when we were leaving and what direction we were headed. The idea when we left was that we chose to head north, south, east or west out of town but that is all we decided. As we headed out of town, we would decide as we went. Sometimes we would stop somewhere and be there for a day, others only an hour or two. It all depended on how we enjoyed it.

The one trip in particular, I swear was where the Seguin adventures came from. We had decided to head west out of town. The normal craziness of getting on the road that morning was nothing out of the ordinary. That year we had a little Volkswagen cabriolet and pulled a little trailer behind with all our camping gear in it. The car was a bit emotional, sometimes it ran perfect and other times not so much so. Every time it was super hot, that thing would spit and sputter and act up. Well, that morning as we were leaving, it was warmer out than usual and so we were not even out of town and it started to spit and sputter and act up. Devin’s dad was pumping and pumping away on the gas and we were all determined that we had to at least get out of town before this thing broke down. The boys were in the back giggling their heads off because they could see the frustration and determination in their dad’s face. As we were all laughing and waiting to see if this thing was going to totally quit or what, all of a sudden, the red and blues came on behind us. We pulled over and the officer was very nice, as apparently, we were speeding with all that had been going on. Devin’s dad explained that we were having some issues and just trying to at least get out of city limits because we knew once we got up to highway speed the issues would go away. The officer said that we needed to slow down but had sympathy on us knowing we were just trying to head out on holidays. But in all the confusion of the morning and trying to get on the road, Devin’s dad had forgotten to put the plate on the little trailer. So, on the side of the road, the officer allowed him to put the plate on the trailer and once that was done, he would let us get going again.

As me and the boys sat in the car, we were talking about the events of the morning and the non-stop giggles coming from the back seat was priceless. One would think that that was the thing Devin loved most about that trip, but no, there was more. That day, we made it as far as Edmonton, a whopping two hours from where we started. We spent the night at a campground just outside the city and by the time we got there, it was already dark. We rushed to set up camp while there was still some sunlight and once the tent was set up, then a fire was started, and we decided to have smokies. We were in a rush and so Devin’s dad decided to cook the whole package of smokies at once, so he decided to use the hamburger cooker and put them all in there to cook. Devin, Branden and I sat at the table and as Devin’s dad brought the smokies over, he opened the hamburger cooker thing and boom all the smokies hit the ground. As he is freaking out telling me to go grab a bowl, the boys just laughed and laughed and laughed. Devin literally had tears running down his face he was laughing so hard. I came back with a bowl and all the smokies were quickly grabbed off the ground and tossed into the bowl with a bunch of water. There was no other food with us, and the boys were hungry and it was late so there were no other options. As we all sat and started to eat, the boys started freaking out because every once and awhile, as they chomped down there was a bit of grittiness. From that day forward when Devin told the story, he said we had dirt dogs for supper that night.

As we went to bed, out came the glow sticks and all you could hear was Devin and his brother giggling away and no one really got any sleep that night.

From there, we made Devin’s next favorite stops. We stopped at guzoo, where Devin and Branden could spend hours. They loved to feed the animals. They even got to hold baby skunks. Devin’s favorite part was always feeding the bears. The bears were so lazy half the time they didn’t even get up, they would just twist their heads and grab the food from there.

After guzoo, we were off to the gopher museum. It is a little place in Torrington, Alberta where they have all these stuffed gophers, and it is set up like you are looking into a gopher hole and they have the gopher’s stuffed and some sort of a scene like sitting at a kitchen table or whatever. We would slowly make our way around checking all of the scenes out and Devin was always so excited, it was like every time we went there was his first time. As we were leaving, we had to stop at the gift shop. Devin and Branden both decided to get a stuffed gopher (not a real one 😊) and so as we headed down the highway to our next stop, Devin decided to torment his dad a bit. He took his gopher and tickled the side of his dad’s neck. Well Eugene wasn’t expecting that and almost had a heart attack. Well that just got Devin laughing even harder and tormenting him even more. I am surprised we didn’t crash that day but Devin had the time of his life. He always said that when he grew up that he wanted to take his family there every year for holidays.

After that, we headed east and ended up in Batoche in Saskatchewan and spent some time around that area. That trip that year was Devin’s favorite Seguin adventure we ever went on. With everything that had happened that year, he talked about it every year after that. Even at such a young age, he always said that when he had a family, he wanted to take them to most of the places we went that year.

During this phase of Devin’s life, he also started playing hockey. Devin decided fairly early on that he wanted to be a goalie. He loved to play goal and even at this age, we were having to buy adult size goal pads and adult size skates. He looked forward to each winter so much as he had so much fun.

With him being so big, and playing goal, he was moved up an age range or two to play goal with the older kids. With Devin’s personality, this was never an issue. No one ever believed that he was his age because he always came across so much older than he actually was. The kids that were on his team always welcomed him in with open arms as he had the maturity to hang out with the age group he was playing with and in a lot of situations, he came across as the older one. The years of playing in older age groups just increased his total friends because he knew everyone from a few years younger to three to four years older.

I remember the one game and there was a kid hanging out in front of the net, Devin went to push him out of the way as the kid was blocking him but, in his attempt, he clipped the kid wrong and the kid dropped to the ice. I will never forget the look on his face. He was absolutely terrified that he had hurt the kid and I just remember him looking to me in the crowd and his eyes were huge. At the end of the game, he came out of the dressing room and was so upset that he may have hurt that other young man unintentionally, but it had happened. He knew at that point the kid was fine, but I knew based on the conversation, that would never happen again. Devin always worried so much about others more than himself and this situation was no different.

In these years of Devin’s life, it was clear that he was going to grow up to be an amazing man. He had such a big heart and though he looked like a big tough guy, anyone that got to know him could see that he was just a big teddy bear.