My Friday started off with covering the Fabulous Food Show at the IX Center for TV20. My friend Crystal Whipkey’s fabulous cupcake company Ciste was the first stand I hit! I had to devour at least one cupcake, right? So I chose the pumpkin caramel one! Sooo delicious!! It had a perfect hint of spice, and just melted in my mouth. Then it was on to the Red Cedar Coffee booth. Red Cedar Coffee is based out of Berea, Ohio and they have over 150 different roasts. I interviewed Anne from Red Cedar, and at the end she let me take home a bag of the Jingle Bell Java! Can’t wait to brew it at Thanksgiving for my family to try! Next was the Cheddar and Potato Pierogies from Pierogies of Cleveland. Being Polish and growing up with handmade pierogies I’ve become kinda a snob about them. But, I must say these were right on! Definitely check out their various flavors at pierogiesofcleveland.com!

Then as I was waiting to interview Cowboy George from Blaze Gourmet (hot sauces & salsa) I ran into Courtney, my roommate at Miss Ohio USA 2004! We haven’t seen each other since we competed 8 years ago! Ironically this weekend was the 2012 competition, so it was literally 8 years ago we last hung out. She had her beautiful baby and her mom with her. So great to see them and hope she and I can catch up soon! Wish I knew what the rest of the girls I met there are up to now. It was such a fun experience and I was lucky that the girls I met were very cool.

My last interview of the food show was with Joel Fink, creator of Fantasy Candies. His truffles were so good, but even better was his dark chocolate with chia seeds. Yes, chia seeds! Like chia pet chia seeds! He educated me on how important chia seeds are, as well as other nutritional facts. Joel and his company work closely with the Cleveland Clinic, and you can find his candies at both the Cleveland Clinic store on the main campus, as well as at fantasycandies.com.

Then later Friday night I headed out to Brothers Lounge to see my dear friends pOUT play! They rocked it out as always. If you never heard pOUT play you really need to get out to a show soon! (poutband.com) Of course right after I left Guy Fieri randomly shows up to see the show. I missed him at Fabulous Food earlier, then I missed him at pOUT. I guess it just wasn’t meant to be…

Saturday and Sunday I covered Cleveland Muny Football championships, but this time on the production end of things. It was a lot of fun having a new challenge getting to run graphics! I thought I knew football, but I really had no clue the difference between a first down and a fourth down. Thank God I had a spotter telling me what the plays were over head set! I have a better clue now but don’t test me, I’m still not that knowledgeable about plays. But I am a lot more knowledgeable about graphics.

Overall it was another crazy, fun and random weekend. On to the next one….