Salted Caramel (and m&m) Pretzel Bark

Surprise! This is neither Carrie nor Hannah writing to you today. I go by Marybeth, although most call me "Mareth", and I have the honor of being a guest on Hannah and Carrie's blog today! I'm pretty new to this whole blogging thing.. okay actually extremely new, as in, this is my first one ever. So bear with me.
Being Christmas break and all, Hannah, Carrie, and myself made it a priority early on that we would meet up one day to eat Panda Express (never can get enough) and find something to bake off of Pinterest.
What did we decide to bake, you ask? Well, let me tell you.
Salted Caramel Pretzel Bark (with our spontaneous crushed m&m topping!)

Here's how (and how not to do it):

Original Ingredients:
1/2 bag of twisted pretzels
2 sticks of butter (1 cup)
1 cup of brown sugar
1 bag of chocolate chips (2 cups)

Our Final Ingredients:
1/2 bag of twisted pretzels
2 jars of Smucker's caramel
1 bag of chocolate chips
1 cup of m&m's

Now, if you feel like you are a cooking guru, feel free to go with the original ingredients. Surely your experience won't be as disastrous as ours.

Instructions:

-To start out, go ahead and preheat your oven to 350º.
-Next, get out a large pan and line it with wax paper. Then, lay out the pretzels side by side until you've covered the pan.

-Now, here is the tricky part--the caramel. The original recipe says to "melt the butter and the brown sugar until the sugar is dissolved. Let it boil gently just until it starts to stick to the bottom and it forms a nice smooth caramel."- MaryEllen M
We tried this...TWICE and failed miserably each time. The first time with consistency, and the second time when we finally got the consistency right.. it was just straight up burnt.

-SO, if you're like us and want to try an easier (and less frustrating) way, your next step is to heat the caramel jars one at a time in the microwave for about 30 seconds.

-Once you've melted the caramel, you are to pour the caramel over the pretzels evenly. If you don't cover every pretzel, that's okay as long as the caramel is at least touching each pretzel to hold the bottom together.
-Once this is complete, put the pan in the oven for 5 minutes.

-Remove the pan and evenly sprinkle the entire bag of chocolate chips.

-You may then put it back in the oven for a minute to help with the melting. Once you take it out, use a spatula to spread the chocolate chips.

-In this optional step we took about a cup of m&m's and crushed them in a plastic bag. Then, sprinkle them on top until your heart's content!

-Now, all you have to do is put it in the freezer for about an hour.  When you take it out, the caramel underneath will still be a little gooey--but what do you really expect?

Now that doesn't sound too bad, right? It's a great treat to make if you're short on time but need a delicious treat to make. Oh, and not to mention it's ridiculously GOOD. I hope you enjoy making/eating it as much as we did! Also, be sure to check back regularly for some pretty cool posts by Carrie and Hannah (they learned everything they know from me). You really don't want to miss out.

-Mareth