snow storms, spring cleaning, slingboxing, silly signs and snacks.

i am home and it's 3 PM on a wednesday afternoon.

weird. 

last night was wausau's "snow-mageddon" so naturally, i was selected (chosen for punishment? just kidding) to work an overnight shift, put together two different stories starting around midnight -- then do live shots on our morning show between 5-7AM, record stand-ups for our ABC affiliates around the state and do live cut-ins during "good morning america" from 7-9 AM.

luckily, i was not alone (after 3:30 AM...before that, i was).

here's my favorite ohio-based forecaster, rob duns and photographer travis -- also doing live shots and showing viewers just how much snow and ice was out there this morning.

 honestly, it was pretty ridiculous.

want to watch me freezing in the snow in the wee hours of the AM?

click here to see my story about crazy wintry road conditions and how you can get a ticket for not cleaning the snow off your car. 

click here to see my story about trucks that had to stop in wausau because there was too much snow to keep going.

the temps are hovering around freezing so a lot of the roads are better now, but it's still crazy to think we barely had any snow just a few short days ago and i got the spring cleaning bug.

one of my new fav things is watching tv while someone's slingboxing.

i know my parents watch when i'm on the news and lately my bff, emily had been watching some shows while she was on vacation. plus some of sean's family watches every once in a while too. it is always an adventure when i see that little red slinky blinking on top of my tv. who will i be watching with tonight? i never know.

 i didn't take a picture of it, but at some point last week i saw that the slingbox was working so i turned on my tv to see what was on. it was "the transformers" movie. i'm still not sure who was watching then, but i'm glad somebody's getting use out of my cable since i'm barely home enough to watch at all. also that whoever it was had been watching "the transformers."

sean introduced me to a delicious new place to eat this month.

it's "townline market" -- very close to work with a funny sign.

 "hot soups, hot sandwiches and hot guys."

haha. yes, please.

also sean helped me make pizza last week (read: rolled the too-cold pizza dough into a crust since i'm a wimpy kid and chopped onions in a very professional manner to put on top of it while i prepped a lot of the other toppings). it was SO GOOD. barbecue sauce, chicken, green peppers, red onions, pineapple and cheese. 

 i've been doing a lot of random cooking lately -- most recently, cinnamon raisin swirl bread (not pictured), chocolate dipped mint meltaways (not pictured), my version of pastel de fideos (which turned into a glorified baked mac & cheese -- still delicious though)...

...and these yummy deseret book lion rolls.

also my sunday school class has requested chocolate-covered bacon.

next week is fast sunday but we'll see after that.

and can you believe february is practically over?! crazy.

happy leap day!

delicious (tiny) food.

last time i made bread, i used the miniature 

bread pan my mom bought for me.

so naturally, i had a lot of tiny bread.

here's what i made:

tiny grilled cheese sandwiches:

 tiny grilled cheese sandwiches with apple slices:

(shown here open-faced)

 tiny breakfast sandwiches:

(with bacon, eggs and cheese)

and in the spirit of tiny food, here's another (less-flattering) picture from my birthday cupcake concoction on super bowl day. sean was obviously very interested in the game and not in my birthday celebration. i think someone took this picture just as i was saying "thanks."

"think you can get done with work early today?"

^ that's what sean asked me two weeks ago when he peeked his head into my edit bay at about 2PM on a thursday -- right in the middle of the week-long murder trial i was covering. 

"umm...sure?"

less than three hours later, we were on the road to madison.

it was the indiana hoosiers (sean's fav team) going up against the hometown badgers in a big ten battle for bragging rights. too bad neither of them is as good as my buckeyes.

we got to go down on the floor for a bit. later we watched from the press box and it was a actually a really good game.

 

 much to sports boy's dismay, indiana lost.

but we still stopped to take a picture of how famous he is --

 

we turned around and headed back to wausau a little after 11PM.

we got back in the wee hours of the morning.

 and i was back at work at 7:30AM.

you're only young once, right?

 finally today, for your viewing pleasure -- 

sports boy tries to wear my winter coat.

 

the skiing (black and) blues.

i don't usually bruise very easily.

that changed when i went skiing for the first time last week.

enter: my good friend, danger phil.

he came from madison for the day to hang out and teach me to ski. if only he would have known how much of a task that would be...

we started with the bunny hill for a few runs (highlighted below in green) and then danger phil thought it would be a fun idea to take me on a more difficult route -- "miracle." it is a blue trail, which means the difficulty level is medium. we skied down it twice and honestly...it's a miracle i didn't die. 

looking back, i had a really good time learning to ski. it was fun watching kids half my size whizzing past me at a zillion miles per hour as i crouched over my skis, silently praying that my bones wouldn't shatter into a million little pieces each time i went tumbling into the ground. danger phil says he's taught three people to ski on granite peak and i was the best. is anyone surprised by that?

i like to think i'm fairly fearless, which would explain the multiple bruises i've developed during the past week, but i turned out to be not-too-bad at skiing and hope to do it again someday (when someone else wants to pay for my ridiculously priced lift ticket and rental skis).

after our adventure, we went to the great dane to meet up with some of my little sister's former flames -- 

( :

they danced on the tables.

i watched.

AND NOW FOR THE VIDEO YOU'VE BEEN WAITING FOR.

here's me skiing.

enjoy.

things that are delicious.

surely you've guessed that in some of my spare time, 

i've been getting creative with food.

remember that caramel i made from scratch?

pop that in the microwave for a few seconds, add to vanilla yogurt and mix in some pieces of green apples and you've got a very tasty 

(and pretty healthy) dessert. 

last week, i also tried my hand at chocolate meltaways.

they taste like the name sounds -- 

pieces of chocolate that melt when you eat them.

kind of a mix between fudge  and boxed chocolate candy?

i also made a variety of bite-sized desserts 

for this weekend's super bowl party.

here's my array of buckeyes (chocolate covered peanut butter balls -- an ohio delicacy) and cake pops.

in case you don't know what cake pops are, they're kind of a combination of cake, lollipops and popsicles (sort of). you make a cake like you usually would, crumble it up, add some cream cheese, sugar, milk and mix it all together. roll the batter into balls and then put them in the fridge until they hold their shape. after a few hours, you can put a toothpick in them and dip them in chocolate coating (i used the same kind that i used for my buckeyes so they had a hard shell) or frost them and then add any kind of decorations you want. 

 also at that super bowl party, 

i got a delicious surprise during the half-time show --

 happy birthday to me ( :

oh my goodness.

has it really been almost a month since the last time i posted here? yikes.

well, no worries, friends. i have a plan to make things up to you. 

i have readied four (yes, FOUR) blog posts that are scheduled to appear in the next few days. prepare yourself to catch up with my life, including my 25th birthday celebration, spontaneous trips to madison and A VIDEO OF ME SKIING FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER. if that doesn't make you want to come back for more, i don't know what will.

well, let me start by saying i've been working a lot lately.

it seems like ever since i moved to wisconsin, the place has been a hotbed for political craziness. my first interview ever (in september 2010) was with a gubernatorial candidate at one of his "brown bag lunch" outings. now, he's our governor and it's been a wild ride ever since. i went to madison last month as people gathered from across the state to turn in millions of signatures in an effort to recall him. 

 there have only been two successful governor recalls in U.S. history.

could this be #3?

 as a journalist, i'm not really allowed to pick sides here but it is interesting to see history happening right in front of me.

 i spent a frozen day in eagle river for the world championship snowmobile derby. all of these people stood out here pretty much all day to watch the races. also they wore animal fur hats. 

 also in some of the saddest news ever, my driver's license expired this weekend and now my last ties to the buckeye state have been officially severed. 

 apparently i was supposed to get my new license within 30 days of moving here so i suppose a year and a half later is almost as good. 

i also (!!!) had a very delightful time at the DMV. 

i know.

WHO KNEW THAT WAS POSSIBLE?!

the guy who took all my money and information chatted with me about ohio sports and football and even told me to have a nice day when i left. my new license should be here later this week. now i will be an official wisconsinite.

anyway. stay tuned for some great updates.

this time...for real.