The Ultimate Snowman -Grinch in a Fort Part 1

With all the recent snow and family visiting, I thought I should take the girls out and show them how to make a snowman. Sad that I haven't done that with the girls since the older one's were young. 

I heard lots of grumbles except from Princess number five who had never really played much in the snow with anyone. We used to go to a cabin each year sledding with family but that stopped a few years ago and other than skiing a few times, she hasn't had much opportunity to go do things in the snow. 

Yes, this does make me feel guilty but being single and having hurt myself snow boarding (never been the same since) and breaking my backside sledding at the cabin once and ending up in the ER, I am not big on taking risks of hurting myself as I usually am the only driver home and if I get hurt or break a leg, the girls don't have someone to taxi them around and I have all the maintanence and upkeep and if I am hurt, that type of thing doesn't get done. 

For example, we had snow several times this week. No one shoveled as they were busy with life and I wasn't feeling well. We had 1/2 in thick ice on the sidewalk and driveway. 

Princess number four slipped on the driveway (you can see we have a little slope to our front yard. She hit her hip hard and the bruise is slowly showing up into a huge black bruise. It was a hard fall. We don't have insurance so I was grateful she wasn't hurt more seriously. A few tears and a good "once over" and I knew she would be OK. So, last night, Princess two and I went out and shoveled what we could but it was mostly ice. I then put out salt. 


Today, the walks are clear. I hesitated letting Princess two help shoveling heavy snow with her recent surgery. We both went easy on the icy parts and it turned out OK but being single makes me take just a bit more caution on what I do knowing that if I get hurt, the girls are alone.

Believe it or not, my youngest two princesses have never made a snowman. Princess four wasn't home this day and let us know later that she was unhappy we made a snowman without her. I roped Prince number one and Princess number one into helping. 

They tried starting their own snow roll and all said, the snow wasn't good for a snowman. Yes, there is an art to making a good snowman. As you can see, the snow was fine for making a snowman. With a little guidance, you can see, they took off and did well with it.

Make a small compact snowball, then press it down onto the snow on the ground, then while you are pressing down, roll. The motion is kind of like when you are rolling a sleeping bag and you don't want the bag to be really big. You keep pressure down on the bag. Similar motion for snowmen. Once the roll is large enough, the weight of the snowball itself is enough to pick up the snow. 

If all the snow in a roll isn't picked up, roll the snow ball back over where you just went and press down more. It will pick up all the snow and then you can move forward.

It was interesting to me that the only clean area of our yard for weeks after was where we picked up the snow for the snowman. It has been a month and today, there was a sliver of the snowman left. I should have taken a picture of it. It has been sunny many days, snowy lots of days and rained a few times and that snowman just kept being there. 
 
Once you have the base, make sure you push some snow at the base of the ball so it doesn't roll. Even if it is on flat ground, the weight of the middle and top layer can pull it to one side if the base isn't good. 

When you are ready to put the second layer on, make sure you have made a "Base" for it on the top of the first ball. As you can see in the picture of us putting the second ball on, there is a buildup kinda like a bowl of snow for it to sit on which will keep the second ball on well. 

Do the same thing for the rest of the layers. no one said it can only be three balls tall. You can see how tall ours is as Prince number one is 6' 4" I think. You may not believe me, but in the top picture, Princess number five is actually standing behind the snowman and you can't see her. It was as tall as she is.

Once the layers are all on, take snow and smooth it into the balls, pounding and rubbing as needed to make the balls hard and even. It can get very lumpy depending on how you roll the ball. 

You can see Prince number one doing that and making the head secure above and Princess five is smoothing it out and adding snow to fill in the lumps in this last picture. Isn't her smile the cutest. She had so much fun making this and that was before we did the final touches I will share in the next posts. I was glad I forced everyone out to play in the snow. It was great fun. More to come....