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Dallas is Love [HD]

Rachel Christianson — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 01:51:15 +0000

After seeing U.S. soldiers based in South Korea on a family trip Patrick and Tania Foster decided they wanted to help. The brother and sister duo created Dallas is Love in 2004 which is a non-profit that support the troops.

“Dallas is Love was created in 2004 in order to specifically benefit troops stationed in South Korea as my brother and I cam to recognize that there are a lot of different remote bases across the world that house and contain United States military troops,” said Tania Foster. “A lot of people were focusing on Iraq and Afghanistan but we have soldiers doing things all across the world.”

“Once we got back home that’s when my sister and I got to talking and we realized that we really needed to recognize all the efforts by the U.S. Military,” said Patrick Foster.

Tania and Patrick decided to go through the Army and Airforce Exchange Service to provide gift certificates to soldiers stationed all over the world.

“No matter where a soldier is going to be there is going to be an AAFES near by,” said Endre Purnsley. “It may not be a fixed facility. It may be a trailer but you are going to have all the creature comforts. You’re going to have Kool Aid. You’re going to have sunflower seeds, beef jerky, toiletries and baby wipes.”

Staff Sergeant Endre Purnsley has been stationed around the world.

“I’ve been stationed in Korea, Kosovo, Iraq and Italy,” said Purnsley. “Being away from home is always tough. There is really no way to describe it. If you’ve never had to leave your family to answer a higher call you may not know that you find a courage that’s inside of you that you never knew existed.”

And the gift certificates provide a little comfort.

“It’s a little slice of home and there is just enough there to get you over the hump,” said Purnsley. “The gift cards go a long way because ATM’s are hard to find in Iraq.”

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Dallas Stars Ice Girls [HD]

Norrelle Dickson — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 07:56:24 +0000

Speed and precision is the name of the game in the NHL. This also holds true for the Dallas Stars Ice Girls.

“We scoop up the ice that the zamboni can’t go out and get,” said Dallas Stars Ice Girl Katherine Voelker.

This responsibility sounds much easier than it actually is.

“As ice girls we have to get out on the ice during team timeouts, get all the excess snow off as fast as we can and we only have two minutes,” said Dallas Stars Ice Girl Grace Sells.

Just like rookie ice girl Kaime OTeter once thought most fans don’t realize how challenging it is to be an ice girl.

“I knew that the girls had skating responsibilities but I had no idea that we got fined if we didn’t get it in time,” said Dallas Stars Ice Girl Kaime OTeter. “It’s intense.”

The Dallas Stars are one of only a few teams in the NHL that have ice girls.

“A lot of the other teams in the NHL actually have grown men that do it,” said Dallas Stars Ice Girl Kristen Sheeley. “We have lots of pretty girls.”

The Dallas Stars Ice Girls have other responsibilities as well. Pregame responsibilities include meet and greet with the fans, in game ice promotions and dance routines.

“On average we have about twenty five different dances all completely different,” said OTeter.

The Dallas Stars Ice Girls game duties are split into two groups: dancers and skaters.

“Once it’s game time the dancers get ready and go up stairs to prep for dance and skaters are going to go down the tunnel to get ready,” said Sheeley.

Once the puck drops and the game begins it’s showtime for the Dallas Stars Ice Girls.

“It’s just two and a half hours after that of just skating and dancing really hard,” said Sheeley. “Ice girls as a whole are becoming very, very popular.”

Fans can catch up with all the ice girls every season at all of the Dallas Stars home games.

Take a look at the video in HD about the Dallas Stars Ice Girls produced by DFWreporting.com above!