ELK RIDGE — It's too late for Kevin and Heidi Bardsley to save their youngest son.
Twelve-year-old Garrett Bardsley became lost during a campout with his father and other Boy Scouts in the rugged High Uintas.
Garrett, who has been missing about two weeks, is presumed dead. His body has not been found.
Now, the Elk Ridge couple is slowly coming to terms with the loss of their child. By no means is the process easy, especially because they have not yet been able to recover his body and say goodbye at a funeral.
But they want to help the next family with a missing child — and the family after that — to have better odds at having a successful search.
For now, they are going to put up markers in the densely wooded area.
In time, they plan to create a family search foundation in Garrett's name.
"We've learned so much," Kevin Bardsley told the Deseret Morning News during an interview at the family's Elk Ridge home. "We've got to get through this first. Then, we'll take this experience and turn this into a positive."
The Bardsleys plan to keep searching until snow stops them from going back to the area where Garrett disappeared.
"We're organizing as volunteers, family and friends to keep going and do a real fine search now — turn over every rock, look under every tree," Kevin Bardsley said. "We'll go week by week."
Those who want to help can get updates, maps and detailed information on what to do at www.findgarrett.org.
The Web site will also direct those interested in donating to the Garrett Bardsley Foundation at the Spanish Fork branch of Zions Bank.
Eventually, the Bardsleys said, any money given to the fund will help create an organization geared toward helping parents launch effective searches.
The Bardsleys appreciate the efforts of the Summit County Sheriff's Department and say deputies and other trained searchers did all they could to recover their son. But they feel valuable time was lost during the first few days after Garrett was reported missing.
"The coordination is so important. You have to work it together," Kevin Bardsley said. "especially with a lost child. When it all comes down to it, the search was my search and my wife's search."
The Bardsleys are frustrated that no trace of their son has been found — but they are resolute in their faith that he's in God's keeping.
They still don't know what happened after he left his father's side to return to camp to change his wet shoes. The walk back to the campsite was about 150 yards.
"I've speculated and speculated. I don't know where he is. I wish I knew," Kevin Bardsley said. "If I did, I'd just end this."
Heidi Bardsley urges parents to give their children extra hugs.
"Just tell all the parents out there to hug their own (children), be the best parents they can be," she said. "That's all that's getting me through this, is knowing I did the best I could."
"The silver lining in this dark cloud is that this little boy has touched so many hearts," Kevin Bardsley said, choking with emotion as he talked about his son in the past tense.
The Bardsleys say Garrett will be missed especially by his older brother, Cameron, who did everything with his sibling.
"They played football together, baseball together," Heidi Bardsley said. "They had the same friends, the same likes and dislikes."
Garrett wanted to follow in his dad's footsteps when he grew older, she said. Their boy was learning the art of finish carpentry.
He was an innocent, sweet boy who loved the Lord," said Kevin Bardsley, whose family are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
"I remember the first day he passed the sacrament in church. He just turned 12 in July. He said, 'Dad, you need to sit over here' so he could pass to us."
E-mail: haddoc@desnews.com