Sarah Palin=Hockey Mom

If football is like religion in the South, then hockey is like religion in Alaska. The local ECHL team here in Anchorage is named the Alaska Aces. Right now is the playoffs. This weekend was the 2nd round against the Victoria Salmon Kings from Canada. We were lucky enough to be able to go on both Friday and Saturday nights. Thanks to Steve from Subways of Alaska for the tickets!!! Unlike the Thrashers games that we are familiar with, there was much, much more fighting, punching, "hooking", "roughing" and "unsportsman-like conduct". [Note to ATL Thrashers Marketing Dept. : Fights=more pumped up, excited crowds=more attendance=more profit and name recognition for the team. ]


Here we are on Friday night, sitting in the VIP box on the "dry" side (alcohol is only sold on one side of the arena, the "wet" side. Security is tight and they check id's A LOT).
Although we liked sitting in the special section with the owners of the team, it was further away from the ice and all of the action. Wouldn't you rather sit in the 100's section of Sanford than the 300's?

On Saturday night we sat on the "wet" side behind Steven's co-worker Robert and his wife Whitney. We met a lot of other friends as well and they were all super nice! I didn't take any pictures because of the plexiglass, but here is a picture of some of the Aces players before the game.


It was actually very funny because on Saturday night, after the Aces scored the first goal of the game, some people threw some frozen chunks of salmon onto the ice. The head got stuck in the net behind the goal...yuck! This man had to come over and get it down using a hockey stick!

The Alaska Aces won the first two games of the 7 game series and are now headed to Victoria to play the next 3 games (well, hopefully only 2)!

Now if we can just introduce the activity of tailgating to the sport of hockey, our lives will be complete.

The rest of the weekend was very laid-back. We worked on painting the dressers and we put polyurethane on the coffee table. It looks so wonderful in the living room! All that's left to do in the room is get Steven a TV and get some decorations (throw pillows, blanket and some baskets for the coffee table). We will get all of these things soon!!!

Here is a picture of the mountains near our apartment. It had been cloudy and overcast for the past few days, so we took this picture when it finally cleared up.


We miss everyone! Come visit soon! Tourist season is quickly approaching...we have started seeing lots of RV's around town!

P.S. It is also 9:30pm and still daylight outside! Hooray for summer! I'll post a picture of my car tomorrow!

Rebekah