Lifestyle

The Arrowhead 135 winter ultra race tests athletes like no other competition. Some run it to test their survival savvy. Others come to test their spirit in the frozen, lonely North Woods. Every competitor has a story.

As winter cold bites deep, MPR News is celebrating the best of the season through a new series called Winter Play. Our staff across the state set out to try a new-to-them winter pastime. MPR News producer Samantha Matsumoto and reporter Simone Cazares visited Watershed Spa in northeast Minneapolis to take a much-needed break from winter. 

For our Winter Play series, where MPR News staff try winter activities new to them, Bemidji bureau reporter Mathew Holding Eagle III drove further — and maybe flew further — than anyone else as he tried winter kiteboarding.

The foods are sold under dozens of different brand names, but all recalled products say Fresh Creative Cuisine on the bottom of the label. The recall affects items sold in nine East Coast states.

As MPR News staff fanned out across the state to experience cold weather activities they had never tried for the Winter Play series, Regina Medina and Elizabeth Shockman took a transformative plunge in Lake Harriet.

Happiness can sometimes feel just out of reach. But having more fun? You've got this — and those giggles and playful moments can make a big difference to your health and well-being.

It’s cold. But the birds here don’t mind. Why not try your hand at joining them? As part of the Winter Play series MPR News’ Amy Felegy took to a snowy, wooded path in northwestern Minnesota to give you the scoop on winter birding for the first time.

Congress ended the temporary benefit meant to help low-income households with pandemic-era hardships. A huge increase in Social Security benefits may mean some households see further SNAP reductions.

Our staff across the state set out to try a new-to-them winter pastime. MPR News’ southwest Minnesota reporter Hannah Yang spent her first day ice fishing with her father-in-law and husband in Faribault, Minn.

Long celebrated by farmers welcoming spring, St. Brigid Day is a bank holiday in Ireland for the first time this year. Though the start of spring is farther off for us here in Minnesota, chef and cookbook author Beth Dooley says there’s no reason we can’t cook up some bread and stew to celebrate, too.