Flags of the World: Dessert Edition

As national treasure Bob Costas observed half a dozen times last night during the Olympics opening ceremonies, this was the fastest moving Parade of Nations ever. The girls and I had to work pretty hard to ID the sports of the various nation’s flag bearers, which made our Olympics bingo game a little more exciting than I had planned. But we got a bingo late in the evening, thanks to table tennis player Feng Tianwei from Singapore.

The evening was definitely a late one. The girls stayed up way past their bedtime, but still conked out before the lighting of the torch. Hannah asked me to wake her up in time for the torch lighting, but when the time came, she was completely out. I watched the last 45 minutes of the ceremonies with two sleeping darlings curled up next to me on the couch, which was a pretty nice way to end the evening.

Earlier last night, the girls didn’t lack for energy. The big hit from our Olympics festivities was “flags of the world” cookie decorating. I baked some sugar cookies in roughly rectangular shapes, and the girls and I decorated them using as inspiration a place mat I picked up at the Parent-Teacher Store that featured the flags of every country in the world. (Well, those that existed in 2011. Sorry, South Sudan!)

The girls loved this. Hannah could have decorated cookies all night long. Here’s a look at our own little version of the United Nations. Hover your mouse over an image to find out which country the flag belongs to.

I’m not sure if I’ll be able to make tonight’s Olympics coverage this exciting, but with gymnastics on the schedule, maybe we’ll be okay.