The Today Show

I have downloaded the pictures from our camera so that I can share some of them with you and the stories that go along with them.  I am going to start with the Today Show.

Matt Lauer and Carter
Matt was also on our plane from
Moscow to New York, Carter
said, Hi, as we passed him
in first class.

We ended up going to the Today Show filming twice.  The first time we went we were unsure how to get to the actual filming.  We could see that the show was near the entrance of the Bolshoy Hockey Arena, but we did not know how to get through security to get there. We tried one entrance and found another American couple trying to do the same thing.  They were told to go to the next security point, so we followed them.  They were turned away, but said to us, "You can probably get in," as they pointed to our credentials from the Olympic Village.  My husband and I looked at each other and said, "Lets try." We did a quick flash of the credentials and kept walking.  It worked, but we had to encounter another security check point.  At this point, the volunteers did not speak English, so there was a lot of pointing and saying show.  They thought we wanted to get into the hockey game that was going to be starting shortly, but eventually our persistence paid off, and they got us the guy from the show that handed out passes for getting to watch the filming of the show.

Meredith

While we were there, Carter did some pin trading with a man that had been going to the Olympic games since the 70's.  He was very nice and Carter was able to choose about 5 or 6 pins off of his large smock of pins and only had to give up one of his own!  He was thrilled! Then Wesley got to do the same!  He was a very generous man and had some really cool pins.

Al

It was interesting to watch the show being filmed.  There was not too much time that the cast was actually on air while we were there.  But it gave us a chance to catch up on the stories from the Olympics because we were not watching tv on a regular basis.  When the cast was not filming, they did come down and talk to the crowd.  They were all very nice and asked us questions about where we were from, what we had seen, and if we were having fun.

Savannah talking nails with Carter

When we were done, I found a Wi-Fi spot as fast as I could hoping to alert our family that we may be on.  Thanks to the fact that Wisconsin does not see the show live, our family was able to catch a glimpse of us.

The second time we went to the taping, it was just Carter and I and it was a Saturday morning, so there were far fewer people in the crowd.  However, the experience was way cooler and we had a sign taped up that said Hi Grandma!!  (Pictures are posted in an earlier post). We met three athletes and some of the families.  Plus, the Today Show has different broadcasters on the weekends, so we met new celebrities.  While at this taping we met Noelle Pikus-Pace the day she won the silver medal.  She was there with her husband and children for the interview, but in the crowd was the rest of her family.  They were so nice and talked with us about Noelle's story and win.  They even gave Carter one of their big signs that they were

Savannah

holding up to cheer her on and he was able to get it autographed. Noelle was as great as she seemed on tv.
We also met Tracy and Lanny Barnes. They are twins that compete in the Biathlon.  Tracy made the Olympic team, but her sister Lanny did not because she was too ill to compete to try to make the team.  Tracy decided to give up her spot to allow Lanny to go! It was a very touching story and these two ladies were also super nice and chatted with us for a long time while the show was not on air.
Look up and read the stories of these three athletes, they are amazing people.  The athletes are one of my favorite parts of the Olympics.  Most of them are amazing people chasing a dream and because they are not professionals, they sacrifice, but the dedication is incredible. I love the stories.

Carter's Interview

Sometimes when you screw something up, things turn out better because of your mistake.  Well, ok, maybe that doesn't happen that often, but in this case, my mistake turned out to be very beneficial for Carter.  You might remember that he wanted to interview a woman, Camilla, that he met from Australia because his class is studying the country.  Well, we did the interview only I didn't actually record it like I thought I did. Ooops! So we had to go back to Camilla and ask to do it again.  She was very understanding and agreed to do it again.  A few days had past, and we finally had time to do the interview, so Carter went searching for Camilla.  He didn't find her, but did find her camera man and explained why he was looking for Camilla.  The camera man smirked at my mistake and said, "I will tape it this time."  This was an incredible experience! Carter got to do a real live interview, with a crew, lights, cameras, and in a studio!  And then, the team did the editing.  It was so cool!  Here is the final copy, it was so fun!

**I am going to continue to post some stories and pictures as I have time because there was lots more I wanted to share, but internet access and difficulty with posting with the IPad limited my ability, so feel free to keep checking in here to see what is new. And feel free to leave me comments, I love getting them and knowing that people are really reading this!

More pictures

*Just a reminder: pictures are not as easy for me to upload and position as I would like, so please forgive me if this seems poorly done, it is not my intention!

One of the Russian regions

Beautiful artwork

Virtual skiing

We are still here!

I know it has been awhile, but things have gotten very busy and all of us have gotten very tired. This combination has left me little time to blog. Our typical day is beginning at the latest with getting out of bed by 9am and then ends with getting back to the hotel as late as midnight. And the time in between is full! To say the least, we are exhausted!

On Monday we went to our last curling game. Though the team did not do as well as we hoped, we are all so proud of them and never stopped cheering for them! They are an amazing group of woman that represented our country with pride at these games. Our family is so lucky to be a part of their efforts.

Display at the Russian Regions
Exhibit of nesting dolls

Since curling was over, we had sometime to explore some of the park and see other sports. One of the most interesting places they have here to explore is the Russian regions exhibit. This is a great big building where there is a display from all of the regions in Russia. Many have interactive exhibits, live demonstrations, and are staffed with people from that particular region that speak English. They were all excited to tell us about their area and often would give us something from their region. Some things we got were honey, postcards, pins, magnets, birch wood cup, stuffed animals, rocks, and a decorative bag. It was so informative and made us realize how little we really knew about Russia. One of my favorite things I saw there was part of the meterorite that hit Russia one year ago.

The part of the meteror
is in the display case 

 We have also gotten to see two other women's hockey games. One was USA versus Sweden in the semifinal and the other was Russia versus Finland. Both were a lot of fun to be at! On the USA game, Brianna Decker had a goal and two assists. Then we got to see speed skating. We went to the women's 5000m race. None of us had ever seen speed skating in person before, so we were all fascinated by this new adventure! The USA did not do well, but we did see a new track record by the winner of course. 

At this point, things are winding down for us. We have one more event to see. We are going to the women's gold medal hockey game tomorrow. We will all be wearing our Decker t-shirts and cheering loudly for Brianna and the rest of the team! The game does not start until 9pm! Going to be so very late for us, and the next day we begin our jouney home.

Musical Experiences

As mentioned previously, there are lots of cultural experiences that we have been apart of. These here are musical videos. The bagpipers are outside of the curling venue before every game and then pipe the teams onto the ice which is a curling tradition. On this particular day there was also a cameraman and guess who he picked out of the crowd? Watch and see!

More pictures

Twin Biathlon athletes. One
gave up her spot on Team
USA so her sister could
compete!

Noelle, she won a silver
medal in skeleton!

We keep "running into" amazing people. Yesterday all of us were to go to a women's hockey game, but realized when we got to the gate that two of our tickets were for a different game! So Donnie and Wesley went to the game and Carter and I went to The Today Show. It was a great experience. We met three amazing athletes, two who are twins, and all had wonderful stories. Look them up and read about them!

Vernon Davis of the San Fransico
49ers is a curling fan!

Practice Interview

Carter is hoping to interview a woman that is working at the P&G Family Home who is from Australia because that is the country they are studying right now. To prepare we wrote out questions and he was reading them back to me when Summer Sanders (yes, the Summer Sanders that works for NBC!) approached us and asked what we were up to. When she realized he was preparing to interview someone she offered to practice with him and gave him pointers! I taped just a small portion of it, how cool!