Carolina Hurricanes Bring On the Fun

Sometimes weekends are just as hard as weekdays when you have kids -- maybe even harder if you're used to being in an office all week. It's not that being home with your children is bad, it's just a different kind of exhausting. The trick when the kids are little is to manage your time together so that no one gets bored and crabby.

So a big weekend win around our house involves finding an activity that is:
a) fun for the whole family, and
b) tiring enough for the kids to take a long afternoon nap.

Our trip to the Caniac Carnival on Saturday met both qualifications, plus (unlike our recent baseball outing) it was also:
c) light on the wallet (free admission, free parking and $1 hot dogs -- does it get any better?),
d) easy to navigate (no traffic problems, plenty of parking spaces and lots of volunteers), and
e) quality time outside on a beautiful day (complete with bouncy slides, obstacle courses and a really good band).

And if all of the above weren't enough, we got a super double bonus: Junius and Pippi were selected (by one of the lovely Storm Squad) to participate in a group photo with the team at center ice after practice. I'm not sure who was more excited, my son or my husband, as the kids walked through the home team tunnel and out onto the ice.

As a lifelong Southerner, I never expected to be a hockey fan. It's a cold, rough sport for a Carolina girl who usually keeps her sports time focused on basketball season. But now that I've experienced the Hurricanes' hospitality, I'm thinking I just might be a hockey fan after all.

Note: As I mentioned above, the event was free of charge. Neither the Hurricanes nor any of their representatives (including Stormy) offered me any sort of compensation for writing this post.