Logan Boulet: the heart behind Green Shirt Day

By Lethbridge Herald on April 4, 2025.

The Boulet family: Logan, Toby, Mariko and Bernadine.

Green Shirt Day has become a national movement, but Logan Boulet’s family wants to remind us who he was

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman – LETHBRIDGE HERALD – apulido@lethbridgeherald.com

Seven years ago, the Humboldt Broncos tragedy rocked the nation, but out of tragedy a legacy was born. One that has helped save multiple lives since then, all thanks to a decision made by a brave young man named Logan Boulet. 

When Logan made the decision to become an organ donor, nobody could have predicted what happened next. The Logan Boulet effect sparked the desire of thousands of people across the country to become organ and tissue donors after his tragic passing. 

Many know his name, his legacy, his decision to become a donor, about Green Shirt Day, about the Humboldt bus crash. But who was Logan Boulet? 

To his parents Bernadine (Bernie) and Toby Boulet, he was not just their son. For Toby, he was a friend, a helping hand and a hot tub buddy. For Bernie, he was her sweet boy, her puzzle companion and her inspiration to tackle Lego construction. For Mariko Boulet-Couture, he was not only her little brother, but also a caring and funny friend as well as her travelling buddy. 

“Logan was my son first for many years, and as he got older became my friend. We did a lot of father-son things, but we also did extra stuff. And then he showed a lot of qualities that I would like in a friend of mine, so we became friends,” says Toby. 

He says he realized he’d become friends with Logan, after a neighbour pointed out that the way they talked to each other while in the hot tub sounded like they were buddies and not father and son. 

“He was always really good at puzzles,” says Bernie. “At Christmas time we always did a puzzle, and we would spend hours around a big 1000-piece puzzle. We often did them at Olds at Toby’s parents’’.”

She says puzzles came easy for Logan as he was able to see how the pieces fit together to form the picture, no matter how little bit of detail was on a piece. 

“My parents did an excellent job of raising us as a family unit, so Logan and I were really good friends,” says Mariko. 

She recalls multiple family trips and says that is one of the reasons why she has so many memories of Logan. 

“We have been to Cabo multiple times, and the first time Logan and I went to Europe was as a family with my parents for Ringette tour for me in 2009,” says Mariko. 

“He got to come along like the team’s little brother, which was really cool to have him there for that experience as it was both our first time in Europe.” 

Logan’s family also enjoyed his creative side. Bernie says that ever since he was little, he enjoyed crafts, building stuff and figuring things out by himself. 

“He took an egg carton once and sat at the kitchen table, he cut and needed tape and I think he was five or so, and he made a Joe Sakic, because he was his favourite hockey player,” says Bernie. 

She remembers the eggs were from a Canadian brand, because even at young age he loved buying Canadian, and he cut out the maple leaf from the egg carton and put it on Sakic’s chest for when he was playing for team Canada in the Olympics. 

“And then he made another one and wouldn’t tell us what he was making,” she says. “When he finished it up, he showed us and it was ‘Darth Egger,’ because he loved Star Wars.”

Toby says, “We still have Darth Egger, it sat on our kitchen shelves since, and right now is in a box because we are renovating the kitchen, but we still have it.”

When it came to sports, Logan loved hockey since he was little – he couldn’t wait to learn how to skate, but that was not the only sport he enjoyed. 

“He played lots of sports,” says Toby. “He played Rugby for about five or six years, badminton for junior and middle school, and he curled in high school.”

Even though Logan was busy with a multitude of sports, he made time to attend his sister Mariko’s events and show his support. 

“Logan was a big cheerleader of mine,” she says. “I got to go to a lot of his games, and he attended a lot of mine.”

She remembers that even though they were busy with their own sports, they always tried their best to be there for each other. 

“I remember we played for the provincial final for ringette, when I was in Grade 10 and Logan was in Grade 7, my dad was coaching his team and my mom was helping with mine and we were in Edmonton while Logan was in Lethbridge playing hockey.”

And even though they were playing in two different cities, Logan and Toby left Lethbridge on a Saturday night to be able to cheer on Mariko on Sunday. 

“They got there super early so they could watch our team play in the finals. We didn’t win but that meant a lot. Even though it was probably my dad’s doing, to have Logan be like ‘I’m going to come too and cheer on my sister,’ meant a lot to me.”

Mariko remembers playing Grade 9 volleyball, something Logan said was painful to watch, but he did it anyways because he wanted to be there for his sister. 

Being only three years apart, meant that Logan and Mariko were able to become close friends, while still having their typical sibling’s moments. But one memory that sticks out to Mariko is how much Logan valued her input when it came to choosing his career, even though it never became clear what he wanted to do, as he had many interests. 

“He was potentially going to go to U of L, and he made sure to ask me for advice,” she says. “And when we went to clean out his room in Humboldt, I found a U of L clipboard and some pens and a notebook I have bought him for his birthday.”

Logan, who was still deciding on a career path at that point, had taken the time to register for some classes and used a notebook his sister gave him to take notes. 

“He had used that notebook to write down the classes he had picked and the notes he wrote when he called me to talk about it, and it meant a lot to find that because I never knew he did that,” says Mariko. 

Even though it was unclear which path Logan would have taken career wise, Bernie remembers what he wanted to be when he was a little boy. 

“When he was little, he had two ambitions: to be either a NHL hockey player, and if that didn’t work out, he was going to be an archeologist like Indiana Jones,” she says.

As he got older, Logan wanted to become an architect or a teacher. He had an interesting relationship with school, as it came easy to him and he had high marks, but because it felt like it was not too much of a challenge for him, he thought he could drop it when having to choose an activity to drop to be able to fit other activities into his schedule. 

“I can’t remember what he wanted to add, but it was something that was going to cost us money, so I asked him to choose something else to drop for this to be added,” says Bernie. 

She remembers him sitting down and thinking about it for a while, as he had many options to choose from. 

“I said ‘you already play hockey, and you have school, and you have swimming, and a bunch of other things he was involved in,’ so I said he had to give up something,” says Bernie. 

And his answer, which he thought made the most sense, was to give up school. 

“And I said, ‘first of all, school doesn’t cost us anything and that’s not an option!’”

As a family, the Boulets enjoyed playing games – well, Toby not so much, but they played together often. Some games had the ability to ruffle Logan’s feathers, either because the rules were not followed to a T, or because his sister may or may not have been cheating. 

Bernie recalls one of those games was Farkle, a game of dice he learned to play with his grandparents, the way they played it. It created some tension when they acquired a game with the proper rules. 

“My parents taught him how to play, how they play, which is not necessarily how the rules are, so when we got an official Farkle game, and we are playing it and following the rules, he kept saying ‘that’s not how you play it!’ and he got mad and left,” says Bernie. 

She adds that whenever they played after that, he would ask which rules were being applied to the game. While playing a board game with Mariko and their cousins, she recalls they ended up arguing about which way the game was going. 

“We were arguing over the rules when he finally gave up, hit me, and I thought I broke my glasses, but they didn’t and my cousins were shocked to see that because Logan and I were not the siblings that fought, so that was very rare,” says Mariko. 

When recalling the same game, Toby says Logan was angry because he thought Mariko was cheating and he was very serious about fairness.

Fairness not just in games, but in all aspects of life, is how Logan lived his own, says Toby, as he was always one to stand up against bullying, even when he had to stand up to his best friends. 

“When he was in curling in Churchill, one of the better players was getting picked on from Grade 9 and up,” says Toby. “Somewhere in that period of time, Logan’s friends were picking on him and Logan stood up and said, ‘no, you stop,’ and that’s why his friend wrote that he was a special friend to him,” says Toby. 

He was referring to over 800 messages that those who knew Logan wrote about him during his celebration of life. It’s something Toby often refers to when talking about Logan, and he has some messages that he always goes back to. One of them was written by someone Toby doesn’t know, but it has a lot of meaning to him. 

“It doesn’t say who it’s from so I always wonder who wrote this: ‘one of the most distinct memories I have of Logan is sitting in Physics, debating if I wanted to run for student council. It was short, but Logan overheard me and go for it because I believe in you.’ That’s who Logan was,” says Toby. 

But of course, nobody is perfect, and the Boulets know that. They also remember the not-so-angelic moments Logan had, like getting into fights when he was in elementary school, even though it was only very few instances. Or expressing his desire to punch someone during his high school years, but not actually doing it. 

And now that Logan is not physically with them, his parents and sister continue to keep his memory alive by sharing his story with anyone who is willing to listen, by speculating how he would react or act during everyday life little moments, and by doing things in his honour. 

“Every Christmas we still buy him Lego and we put it together on April 7 while visiting his grave,” says Bernie. “This year we are making a John Deere tractor because ever since he was a little boy he loved tractors.”. 

They also continue to celebrate his birthday every year and say his name whenever the conversation allows it. 

“As much as we would like him to walk through our front door, we know that’s not going to happen,” says Bernie. “But the fact that we get to talk about him like he might walk through the front door, it’s really important to us.”

She explains they are not “stuck” and they are aware that he is not coming back, but being able to talk about him helps their grieving process and they appreciate the fact that people are willing to listen. 

“During one of counselling sessions they said to us, ‘always say your loved one’s name,’ so whenever we are having a conversation, we say his name, we say Logan,” says Toby.