Mites & Midgets

Today was Mites & Midgets Day, an annual torch-passing ceremony for the kids' hockey club, celebrated with the youngest team at the last home game of the oldest team. The Mites (youngest kids) have a game in the morning, then get breakfast in the rink's banquet room. After breakfast, they go into the locker room with the Midgets (oldest kids) and hang out. The Midgets come out to help with Mite practices, sometimes, so the kids aren't strangers to each other. The two teams also have the same head coach this year, so he knows all the kids quite well and had a good time pairing them up.

















After the locker room pow-wow, the Mites got on the ice to participate in the game introductions and a ceremonial puck drop to commemorate the last time these older kids will play on home ice for the Bears. Here's a video of the game intro:



The ceremonial puck was dropped by a Mite (name picked from a hat):

After the opening ceremony, the little kids went back up to the banquet room for a hockey-puck pinata and got commemorative T-shirts from the Midget Moms. It was a sweet day. As I stood watching the puck drop, Mites between Midgets twice their size, I sighed and said, "Tomorrow." The mother next to me chuckled, "Yesterday," in response and I knew she knew exactly what I meant.