Charitable Gift Giving

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 5 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

If you look at pictures of the US athletes in the Olympic Village, you’ll see them wearing these very stylish polo shirts…from Nike, of all companies.

The shirt has the official USA Olympics logo on the right chest, the Nike swoosh on the left, and the words ‘Beijing” on the left sleeve to commemorate the 2008 Games. It’s an extremely comfortable and light shirt, made of 65% cotton and 35% polyester (also known as NikeFIT DRY for its comfort and its ability to let your skin breathe).

At $44.99, it’s certainly more affordable than the polo shirts with the horsies. And of course, a portion of your proceeds goes to help the great USA Athletes who have been doing our country proud throughout these last 12 days.

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 6 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

One of the things that impresses me a lot this year is NBC’s coverage of the Olympics. I remember a few years ago, they attempted to do several pay-per-view channels and it flopped tremendously. They made a wise decision this year of using all the technology they have available to them to openly provide as much coverage as possible, using their Telemundo, MSNBC, CNBC, and USA stations, as well as the Web. There was a point I was watching basketball on NBC on my HDTV, volleyball on MSNBC in my picture-in-picture, and baseball and ping-pong on my computer, all at once. Kudos to NBC for a great job.

Providing sports online has given me a huge appreciation for so many other sports I otherwise wouldn’t have seen. The other night, I was watching the crew competition. I’ve gotten a new appreciation for badminton. In the wee hours of the morning, I’ve even watched weightlifting, archery, diving, equestrian, fencing, sailing, soccer, softball, tennis, trampoline, weightlifting, and water polo. The one sports I admittedly don’t quite get is judo. To me, it looks a lot like what I see on the subway in New York City every day.

As of this moment, I’m watching the men’s triathalon live…and I am exhausted just watching it!

A great way to remember all the great moments across all the sports is with this neat little set that I highlighted in an earlier post. It’s a set of 38 frosted shot glasses, each highlighting a different sport and with one of the cute little Beijing mascots on them.

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 7 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

Today’s Olympic Souvenir is this pair of very stylish crew socks with the Beijing 2008 logo and the Olympic rings.

We all buy crew socks these days, but do you know what the history of the word is? According to the American Heritage dictionary, a crew sock is “A warm, usually ribbed sock,” named as such “from its use by rowers”.

And speaking of rowing, today marked the conclusion of crew events at the 2008 Olympics. The US brought home one bronze (the Men’s Eight), one silver (Michelle Guerette in the women’s single sculls), and one gold (a dramatic upset win by the Women’s Eight). Here’s a picture of the women’s team accepting their gold medals (and of course, no one wears socks anymore).

I’m surprised the sport isn’t given a little more exposure, given its prominence at our country’s best universities, but with performances like this, hopefully more young people will be inspired for years to come!

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 9 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

Is there a little 0 to 6 month old in your life who already crawls at world record pace AND who already loves to hit, dive, jump, and dribble with the best of them?

Here’s the cutest little gift from the US Olympic Shop. It’s a little onesie and bib for an infant with the Team USA Olympic Rings and the words “FUTURE OLYMPIAN” across the front in maroon on both pieces. Both are 100% cotton, and the bib has a velcro closure.

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 10 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

I can’t remember the last time I sat on the edge of my seat so much watching the Olympics. A few nights ago it was the men’s swimming team. Tonight, Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson were the ones responsible for me, as well as our whole country, having to catch our collective breath.

Both women did our country proud by winning the gold and silver medal in the Women’s All-Around, the first time ever that American women have placed first and second in this event. It went down to the very last event, the floor exercise. Both executed it flawlessly when they needed to.

Admittedly, after China ran away with the men’s and women’s team competition, I started to wonder if USA Gymnastics was going the way of other once-great programs like the Russian and Romanian programs. But after watching Liukin and Johnson, I’m comforted to know that Team USA is alive and well.

Here’s a picture from tonight of Liukin and Johnson on the medal stand, with Chinese Yang Yilin:

One thing I admire about all the USA Athletes is that, while governments in other countries sometimes heavily subsidize their Olympic programs and start molding athletes from the time they’re babies, largely for the purposes of propoganda, the young men and women in the US work hard solely because they’re pursuing their dream and the passion for their sport. Not to say that other athletes in other countries don’t do that, but without the shadow of a government machine, something about it just seems more authentic.

Celebrate the moment and show your support for the dream with these Team USA Gymnastic duds!

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 11 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

These are three souvenir balls from the 2008 Beijing Olympics, specifically a souvenir basketball, souvenir soccer ball, and a souvenir volleyball.

They’re all regulation-sized, so you can use them for playing these three sports. But they also make great souvenirs from the Games, as they also come with the official 2008 Summer Olympics logo, the words “Beijing 2008”, and the Olympic Rings on them, as well as the official mascots BeiBei, JingJing, HuanHuan, YingYing, and NiNi. You can read all about the meaning of the logo and the story behind the mascots here.

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 12 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop. Today, we’re going to talk about the history of Olympic Pins and Olympic Pin Trading.

Olympics Pin Trading has been around since the first modern Olympics in 1896. The first “pins” were originally cardboard discs that were designed to identify athletes by their countries, officials, and the press. Some Olympians that year started to trade their own badges with others as gestures of goodwill, and a tradition was started. To the right, you see an image of a judge’s pin from the 1900 Olympics in Paris.

In the next few decades, more official pins were created to identify different groups, from the International Olympic Committee to members of the media. The pins started to become more stylized and resemble jewelry and eventually were produced for sale to spectators as well as participants. By the time of the 1924 Summer Games in Paris, the concept of the Olympic Village began, and so participants in the Olympics started to exchange their countries’ pins in earnest.

From 1933 to 1936, more than 1 million pins were sold to the public to help underwrite the games in Germany. To the right, you see the very rare pin from the 1936 Berlin Games. In 1940, even though the Olympics were cancelled during the war, pins were still produced.

In 1968’s games in Mexico City, the pin with a clitch to fasten the pin to clothing, which has become the norm today, was introduced. Pin collecting and pin trading took off in a big way in the Lake Placid Winter Games in 1980 and the Los Angeles Summer Games in 1984. Since then, it’s become an international event in itself.

Here are some pins from this year’s Olympics in Beijing, for sale from the official shop of the US Olympic Team. These all have the official Beijing 2008 logo. Unlike with other pin shops, you can be sure these proceeds will go directly to support our athletes. Just click on any pin, and you’ll be brought to the Olympic Store to buy it.

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 13 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

On Monday morning at 11:30 AM (11:30 PM Sunday night), the USA Men’s Swim team of ichael Phelps, Garrett Weber-Gale, Cullen Jones, and Jason Lezak (who crushed the record for the leg time) turned in the first “wow” moment of the games for me. After an drought of two Olympics, they brought the gold medal back to the 4×100 relay in dramatic fashion. The US won over the French team by all of .06 seconds, breaking their world record and the Olympic record.

Making the victory extra sweet was that the French team was heavily favored–and had been talking trash against the US team. But in good old fashioned Team USA style, the team said all they needed to say through their actions. And of course, the victory is going to helps Phelps become the most decorated Olympian in history.

Here’s a picture of them on the medal stand receiving their gold medals:

Celebrate their victory with the same jackets they wore on the medal stand!

Or if you prefer, get an official Team USA Swimming T-Shirt or Hoody!

Cheer on Team USA and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been highlighting great Olympics souvenirs where proceeds go to support the athletes of the US Olympic Team.

For the next 14 days, we’ll highlight one new product each evening from the US Olympic Shop.

On Sunday evening Beijing time (Sunday morning US time), Team USA and the Chinese National Team faced off in what they’re calling the most-watched basketball game in history, watched by over 500,000 people.

It was a surprisingly competitive game in the beginning. The team from China, playing with an enthusiastic home field crowd, sharp three-point shooting, and the hopes of 1.3 billion people on their shoulders, put up a valiant fight, keeping the score close well into the second quarter. But then Team USA kicked it up a notch and put the game away.

You can recreate the event yourself by getting replicas of the jerseys that were worn in the game. For the China team, you can get a red Yi Jianlian jersey with yellow trim with the word CHINA written in block letters. For the US team, you can get the Kobe Bryant Olympics jersey and Lebron James Olympics jersey which are white with blue trim, as worn in the game.

You can also get the official Beijing 2008 China team jacket
and 2008 Team USA Team Jacket

Of course, the real winner is Nike, whose “swoosh” appears on every one of these!

Cheer on Team USA by wearing their official apparel, and check back here each day to track their progress on this official medal count widget.