With Golden Hearts

The 2010 Olympics have come to an end. They were an amazing, if at times troubled, games. I think something that came as a bit of a surprise to everyone is how patriotic Canadians are and how unabashedly we showed it to the world. Canadians are usually more reserved, more quiet in our patriotism but for the entirety of the games we were loud and proud as we showed how much we love our fabulous country!

These games will be remembered for many things, some wonderful and some heartbreaking.
The weather was a factor, with snow actually having to be hauled in. If only that had been the worst thing to happen.

Before the games even got underway there was the tragic death of Nodar Kumaritashvili, the Georgian luger. Only 21 years old, he died during a training run.


Joannie Rochette, a Canadian figure skater, had to dig deep and continue with true courage. Her mother Therese came to watch Joannie compete but died of a massive heart attack two days before the figure skating started. Joannie finished the Olympics with a bronze medal and the heart of the nation.

Canada's first gold was won by Alexandre Bilodeau. The 22 year old mogul skier will go down in history... it was the first time ever that Canada won an Olympic gold on home soil!

The medals presented at this years Olympics were beautiful, not just awards they were also pieces of art:

And it came as no surprise, at least to me, that the USA led the medal count finishing the games with a total of 37 medals! Congrats to all of my American friends!

Canada can be proud though, we may have brought home "only" 26 medals (finishing 3rd in the overall medal count) but 14 of those were gold... a record amount for any country in the history of the winter Olympics!

The Terry Fox Award, created by the Fox family, was awarded to Joannie Rochette and Petra Majdic - the Slovenian cross country skier who finished with a bronze, and her country's first medal, despite broken ribs and a punctured lung.

Besides the above these are moments that will stick with me:

The intense final for Men's Hockey, the US tieing it up in the last few minutes of regulation play and the dramatic OT goal that Sid the Kid scored for the Canadian gold. The energy in that building must have been incredible! I listened to the game on the way home from penning and saw recaps during the evening. I think if I had been there I would have needed medical attention! lol

Yu-Na Kim's breathtaking figure skating.

Jon Montgomery winning the gold in Men's Skeleton and strolling the streets with a pitcher of beer. How Canadian! lol

Shaun White's amazing snowboarding skills.

Melissa Hollingsworth's tears as she said "I feel like I've let my entire country down"

The last few minutes of the Mens Curling bronze medal match... to be honest I've never really been a curling fan and I found it incredibly intense.

The Canadian Womens Hockey gold.

The medal skate for Mens Short Track Speedskating... the crash, the disqualification of South Korea's Sung Si-Bak, the resulting gold and bronze medals for Canadians and silver to the USA.

And Jasey-Jay Anderson finally getting his Olympic medal. The snowboarder has won numerous awards but despite this being his fourth Olympic games he had never won an Olympic medal. I don't think he minds though, the wait was worth it... he won gold.

**unfortunately I was not at the Olympics, so none of these pictures were taken by me. They were all found online thanks to Google Images**