Addio Olimpiadi

Arrivederci. Today we close the books on another exciting Winter Olympics! For the last 16 days our evening schedule as a family (well, me, Jeff and Danielle) has revolved around the nightly NBC broadcast as we watched the highlights of the day. (NOTE: Jeff consumed way more during the day and late nights thanks to streaming Peacock. And we're not really sure how much Naomi was able to watch while busy at college...) 

Every night, the three of us kept tabs on the featured American athletes: Mikaela Shiffrin (skiing), Chloe Kim (snowboarding), Jordan Stolz (speedskating), Kaillie Humphries  and Elana Meyers Taylor (bobsled), Korey and Cory (curlers) and Amber Glenn, Alysa Lui and Ilia Malinin (figure skaters). We tracked the medal count as Norway grabbed the lead and stayed on top the whole time, while the US climbed to second place overall. We were invested - we did our part.

Oh, and I should mention that two of those golds made history:

One other mention was a debut event that surprisingly made it on our radar: Ski Mountaineering, or SkiMo for short. What a wild, multi-discipline sport: trek uphill in skis with special "skins" for traction, remove the skis and carry in backpack while climbing up stairs, remove covers from skis to ski downhill and do that sequence with multiple transitions. It's a grueling endurance sport and was showcased through sprint and mixed relay events. Maybe they could make it even more exciting if they added a pistol and targets, fire making, and being chased by a bear!

For now, we put away our Olympic shirts and hats and wait 4 years for the next round in 2032! Ohmy, our evenings will look somewhat different then: Jeff and I will likely be on the couch watching, but Naomi will be out of college working who knows where, Danielle will be in college who knows where and Trixie would be 16 years old, and well, time will tell... 💜💛🩵