Olympic Fever!

I. Love. The Olympics!

I think the Olympics are one of the most exciting times to be an American and get swept up in the competition, the intensity and the passion of the athletes and the countries they represent.  I love hearing their stories of how they made it, and the adversity they overcame to be at the games. 

As kids, Melissa and I used to follow the Olympics like it was our jobs.  I'm sure if you look hard enough at my parents house, you'll find VHS tapes of all the opening ceremonies during the 80's.  When the games started, Melissa and I cut out all the newspaper articles about the Olympics, followed the medal counts each day and even made giant Olympic scrapbooks featuring every magazine article from the entire summer (I can't lie, we were kind of losers). 

We loved all the sports, but especially gymnastics.  I spent many summer afternoons sprinting down the vault runway (aka the dining room into the living room) and then vaulting over the square pink ottoman we had in the living room (the couch was mint colored with pink flowers and the coordinating ottoman was pink -- needless to say, it was the 80's) pretending that I was about to bring home gold. 

When I finished vaulting practice, I spent my free time writing letters to Kim Zmeskal (she was way cooler than Shannon Miller because she didn't wear ugly hair puffs). 

Kim - My childhood hero!

Shannon - Kim's not-as-cool teammate based solely on the hair puff
(although she was clearly 100% cooler than me, the girl vaulting off the ottoman)

When we weren't busy watching the Olympics or writing to the stars, we participated in backyard Olympics at our friend Julie's house!  We had tons of competitions including the cartwheel competition, swimming, broomstick throwing (aka the javelin) and relays.  

During the last time the summer Olympics were taking place, I traded in the vault runway and instead ran down the aisle to marry Denny.  We didn't plan to get married during the Olympic festivities, but it kind of adds to the magic of the games. 

This year I won't be vaulting or running down the aisle but I'll gladly take my seat as a spectator and sport my red & blue.  The opening ceremony kicks off in just a few hours!! 

Go Team USA!!

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