My name is Juliana MacEwen and I am a Hockey Mom! Some people might think there would be better ways to describe yourself, but it's the best way for me to describe how hockey has been and still is such a huge part of my life. My husband, Craig and I have had the privilege of raising two passionate, successful, kind and talented boys who are now grown young men. They are Kurtis who is 27 and Zack who is 22. We are your typical Canadian family who loves the game of hockey. Both of our boys played from the time they were 3 years old. Over the years we have met many great people, had so many wonderful experiences, and some not so wonderful experiences, but they all culminated into one very special night that I will remember and cherish for the rest of my life. It was the night one of my boys played his first game in the NHL! Yes, that's right, my baby, Zack MacEwen made his NHL debut on Monday, February 11, 2019 for the Vancouver Canucks. It was during this whirl wind of events that I realized there are so many stories, people and experiences that got us to this point that I should start writing them down. So then I thought, where should I do this? I could start a journal, maybe a scrapbook, or perhaps I could do a blog! So here we are...welcome to my blog that will represent My Diary of being a Hockey Mom. This space will be a culmination of many stories of the hockey experiences we had through our journey that ends up turning into one pretty special and memorable night. These stories won't be in any particular order as memories don't work that way. It will just be random stories that pop into my head as I reminisce about the experiences and life long memories the sport of hockey has given our family.

So back to the "NHL Debut". It was a typical Sunday morning. I woke up around 8:30 after watching Zack's game on AHL TV as his team the Utica Comets took on the Rochester Americans the night before. I watched it at my sister-in-law's (Crystal) house as we typically get together with family or friends to watch Zack's games. This week end was a little different though as Craig and my brother, Jeff had actually took a road trip to watch Zack play in Utica because they had 3 games and 3 days so it was a great opportunity for them to watch Zack play live. Zack had just had a career night getting 4 points and played what I thought was the best game of his career, but being a proud hockey mama I have said that alot! So anyway, I wake up and do what I always do and check my phone to see all of the comments and updates on social media from the previous night's game. However, what I see first is a text from Zack that said, "Mom you have to call me when you wake up!" The text came at around 2:00 am and it is now 8:30 am. I know that at that time, Zack was traveling on a bus heading to his next game on Sunday afternoon in Bridgeport. The next text I saw was, "Mom you are gonna wake up to this but RJ just called me I'm going up!" Boy oh boy was I excited! So immediately, I call Zack....and got his voicemail! Of course I did, it was 7:30 am for him and he had just traveled all night on a bus to Bridgeport. Through my tears of excitement, I try to leave him a voicemail to call me back as soon as possible! So now I'm pacing around the kitchen smiling, crying, and waiting! I couldn't call anyone yet to tell them because I needed to get the details from him first. So I waited for what seemed like an eternity and it was about 10 minutes, lol. The phone rings and it's Zack! Finally, I hear the words from him that I know he has been waiting for his whole life and he says, "Mom, I got called up to the NHL!" He fills me in on the details and says that he is leaving for Vancouver first thing as a car was picking him up very soon to take him to the airport. After we chat for a while I ask him if I can now start telling everyone and he says that he still hasn't called his father, grandparents or his brother yet and he really wanted to be the one to tell them. So it was back to waiting once again for me! As Zack is calling and telling everyone my family starts calling me and finally I can express the feelings of pride and happiness I am feeling to someone other than Oliver - he's our dog by the way!

As Sunday moves on and things become official it turns into a day of receiving phone calls, texts and personal messages of congratulations. It also meant that Craig and Jeff who were still at Zack's house in Utica, ended up heading home early instead of going to Bridgeport now that Zack wouldn't be playing in that game. It was just an awesome day of chatting with many friends and family about Zack getting the call but we still didn't know if/when he would even get to play. With this being his first call up, he could have just been going up to sit as an extra so we really didn't know what to expect but it didn't matter, I was still so thrilled that he was getting this experience.

It's now 10:00 pm on Sunday night and I have just crawled into bed. Still beaming from the news and excitement of the day, I get a phone call and it's a Vancouver phone number. When I answer the phone, a lovely young lady is on the other end and she says, "Hi Juliana, this is Andrea from the Vancouver Canucks organization. I am calling to let you know that Coach Green has just given us the go ahead that Zack will more than likely be playing tomorrow night and we would like to get you and your husband out here for the game, but there's one thing we would like to ask and that is you can't tell Zack he is playing or that your are coming!" Needless to say, I was no longer tired! So I hop up out of bed and Andrea and I start looking at flights. Now what some folks might not realize is that we were planning a trip to get from one coast of Canada all the way to the other coast in less than 24 hours! And remember at this point, Craig and Jeff are somewhere between Utica and PEI on their way home. Through many phone calls and text messages Andrea worked her magic and our best solution was for me to leave from Moncton at 5:30 am and Craig and Jeff to drive to Saint John and leave from there at 7:00 am. So with flights booked, I do a panic version of packing and leave my house at 2:00 am to drive 2 hours to Moncton to catch my flight!

I arrive in Vancouver and it's just before lunch Vancouver time. I get to my hotel and receive a text from Zack. He tells me that he just found out he is playing tonight and if there is anyway we could still get there on such short notice to watch his game! Can you just imagine how I was feeling at this point, knowing I was already there, along with his girlfriend (Lindsay) and Craig and Jeff were on their way! Being resourceful Lindsay and I set a little plan in motion to surprise him. We found out when he would get back to his hotel room for his pregame nap and off we go. We get his room number and head to his room to surprise him. This might sound odd, since hotels are not supposed to give you guest room numbers or allow random people to just go to other people's rooms to surprise them, but believe me this hockey mama can be very convincing! So we get to his room and I knock on the door, saying "Room Service" and of course covering the little peep hole....he opens the door and I yell "Surprise" and he simply says, "You're here?!?" Wow, I still get emotional about so many parts of this day but this was probably the best moment of the whole experience.

Everyone arrives and we all settle in and get ready to head to the rink. When we arrive, Andrea greets us with our tickets and explains to us how the evening will work, and that we want to make sure we are at ice level for the beginning of the warm up. So off we go to watch the warm up and as I am standing there ready with my phone in hand getting a video of him coming out of the dressing room to do his "rookie lap" on the ice before the rest of his teammates come out, it actually hits me, and I thought to myself, "My son is playing in the NHL!" I will never forget that moment. It was like time stopped for just a second and so many thoughts entered my mind about how he worked so hard to get to this moment. I won't get into all of those thoughts now, but they will come in later posts.

It. Was. Unbelievable.

Warm up was over and now the game is about to start. We are sitting in our seats looking down at the starting line ups and, Oh My Goodness, Zack is starting the game. So here come the tears again. Imagine this, I'm standing at Rogers Arena waiting for an NHL game to start, listening to our National Anthem and watching my son on the ice with his teammates getting ready to start the game! There are just no words to describe this feeling.

As the game goes on, I am sitting there watching Number 71 and moving with his every move, just like I always do and it hits me again. I realize that I haven't even really noticed one other player and there were some darn good ones on the ice that night, not only for Vancouver but also for San Jose. I thought, how could this get any better? Well it did. We are in the third period and unfortunately we were losing, however Zack comes into the Sharks end and gets a really good chance to score. However the goalie makes the save, but Zack stays with it and gets the puck back in the corner and passes it out to the slot where Derek Pouliot puts it in the net. Zack gets his first NHL assist! My heart was exploding at this point.

The game ends and Vancouver loses, but there was no way that would dampen our spirits. We waited for Zack to come out after the game, just like we always do when we watch him live only this time we were in a comfy room with other family and friends of other Canucks players. When he comes out and we take some pictures with him, he pulls something out of his pocket and says to his Dad, "Here, I want you to have this, we did it." Can you guess what it was....it was his 1st assist puck! So yep, the waterfall of tears started once again!

My last moment that I recall really sticking in my memory from this unbelievable night was when we were all sitting at the lobby bar after the game, and Zack got the chance to call his big brother Kurtis. Unfortunately, Kurt wasn't able to make it to the big game, but he got a bunch of his friends together and they watched from the east coast, along with many other supportive family and friends who I'm sure were all exhausted heading to work the next day! Anyway, I hear Zack tell Kurtis about the experience and how he wished Kurt could have been there, and Kurt telling him how proud of him he was. My heart swelled once again with so much pride and completeness. In that moment we were all together, sharing this amazing time in Zack's life and each and every one of us could not have been more proud of him. It was perfect.