Moments before taking the stage for their opening night performance, the dancers of Momentum Dance Collective breathed deep and brainstormed to solve the best kind of last-minute problem: not enough chairs for their sold out audience.

Col. Morris Goins at the conclusion of the ceremony.
Thursday's Army redeployment ceremony was an emotional moment for Col. Morris Goins. As commander of the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, he paused to collect himself a couple times as he addressed the troops and their families in attendance at the Sullivan Arena.

Halloween is the favorite holiday of the year for Kristen Schwarz and she celebrates by having decorations up the entire month of October at her Kempton Hills home and drives around Anchorage with a skeleton riding shotgun and license plates that read MORB1D.

Potter Marsh is a special place in any season. On Tuesday, October 23, I took a few minutes to explore it in one of its most inviting states.

Jeremy Gaston (Donkey) and Perry Sook (Shrek) rehearse a scene for Shrek The Musical.Matty Burns, right, works with Dance Captain Susan Leilani Gearou in a hallway adjacent to the stage.

Jim Conner looks at bridge damage on Forest Road.Kenai Peninsula Borough road inspector Jim Conner talks about how flooding has affected subdivisions just outside the city of Seward, Alaska, on Friday, September 21, 2012.

Travis Beals was forced to evacuate his dog kennel along Exit Glacier Road in Seward as water began to flood his property on Wednesday, September 19, 2012. Beals operates his 47-dog Turning Heads Kennel with Sarah Stokey.

Former Anchorage Daily News photo editor Richard J. Murphy documented three days of wind on the Anchorage Hillside in a collection of iPhone photographs. Winds in the Potter Valley drainage were clocked unofficially at close to 100 mph on Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2012.

Amanda and Brian Walch.On the main roads, you might not notice that there's still large patches of the city without power. But take just a couple turns from Muldoon Road, Raspberry Road or the Old Seward Highway and streets are eerily dark. It's the result of a massive windstorm that hit the Anchorage area late Tuesday. It toppled countless trees and wreaked havoc on power lines.

Adam McCullough helps his daughter, Lily, across a creek. Dogs Cu and Daisy wait at left.Fall colors are creeping from the peaks and alpine tundra of the Chugach Mountains down into the Anchorage bowl. It won't be long until the snow gives chase. Until then, Arctic Valley is a bright and beautiful place to enjoy autumn. About a dozen cars made their way to the end of Arctic Valley Road for a morning of hiking and berry picking on Labor Day, September 3. Though the skies were gray, the ground cover seemed to glow blueberry bushes, fireweed and false hellebore in varying degrees of red, yellow and orange.,

Dan and Pat Huddleson.Butte residents Dan and Pat Huddleson have a beautiful overlook of the Matanuska River from the top of a dike at the edge of their property. The view, near mile 13 of the Old Glenn Highway, got a little more peculiar and much more alarming earlier this week when a house fell into the river about a mile upstream and came to rest a few hundred yards from their 6-acre parcel. “I’m going to lose all my property if they don’t do something up here real soon,” Pat said Wednesday.

Shannon Lusk.It's one little letter that makes a big difference. The Alaska Backpackers Inn is a hostel, not a hotel. Assistant property manager Shannon Lusk is happy to explain the difference to visitors, and often does. But if a visiting vacationer arrives expecting upscale lodging, the mural featuring three creepy heads facing the parking lot might be a giveaway.

"We're not a hotel by any means. You won't find a small soap on your pillow," Lusk said.

For travelers expecting more quirk than comfort, the hostel at the east end of downtown Anchorage has much more art to discover inside.

Produce ripens in a vegetable garden dedicated to growing food donations Friday, August 31, 2012 at Turnagain United Methodist Church in west Anchorage. I have seen the garden progress every day as I come and go from home past the church, and the sign always brings a smile to my face. I finally stopped for a photo after the plants got large enough to fill the scene alongside the sign. The small crop will be given to the Downtown Soup Kitchen, and the church hopes to expand the garden next year.

Great Land Trust executive director Phil Shephard led a walk to the Campbell Creek Estuary on Anchorage's western coast. The tour included U.S. senators Mark Begich, D-Alaska, and Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, U.S. Fish and Wildlife director Dan Ashe and others. Shephard said he hoped to show the dignitaries a successful example of a public-private partnership in conservation of important wildlife habitat and wetlands.

There are countless places to watch the sun set over the coastal waters near Anchorage. The overlook at the Port of Anchorage Boat Launch might be one of the least welcoming. The small parking area is at the end of a bumpy, unpaved road that’s nearly hidden within industrial Anchorage. It has an urban flavor you won't find on Turnagain Arm or Point Woronzof.

An unknown artist made a daily commute to work into a joyful experience. Tiny cairns had been painstakingly built in Chester Creek, making for an unexpected sculpture garden. Photos by Anne Raup

Archbishop Francis Hurley conducted a Catholic mass inside the hospital that is caring for him on Friday, July 27. Hurley, 85, injured his shoulder in a fall in San Francisco earlier this year and has been receiving care in California and Alaska in recent months.

When tide the is going out and summer light is just right on Turnagain Arm and the Anchorage Coastal Wildlife Refuge, the mud seems to take on a satin-smooth texture. Earlier this week, I explored the area with an eye for interesting patterns in the mud as evening turned to night.

Ginger Gorsuch, center, dances with Herb Worthley.Megan Green and Freddy Reyes.A rest between dances.
Anchorage folk dancers keep a lively home on Government Hill. Eight dance clubs make the Anchorage Square and Round Dance Center active with calls, twirls and promenades. On Wednesday, the Stardusters Square Dance Club attracted a dozen dancers to its weekly lesson.