Family Life

Yesterday it wasn’t my idea to go outside and play in the snow, and yet I enjoyed it. So this afternoon, at lunch, I declared my intention of building an igloo. We had lots of snow, it was just below freezing (so the snow was easy to pack without being slushy), I had the whole afternoon off, and I’d had fun the day before. I had also never before attempted to build an igloo.

I’ll save you having to read to the end: I didn’t end up with an igloo, as you can see from the photo. Instead, I got a castle turret, minus the castle.

Back to the story. I had a rectangular bucket, a shovel and lots of snow. How hard could it be? I’d build right in the middle of the yard, to minimize how far I had to haul snow. It was a simple process: use the shovel to fill the bucket with snow, tamp the snow down with the shovel, and upend the bucket. Do this in a circle, fill in the gaps between the blocks, and start a new row. Simple.

The first problem was the square blocks refused to lean in toward the middle, like they were supposed to. They went straight up, making nice, structurally sound walls, but definitely not a nice, (supposedly) structurally sound dome. Being completely clueless, I wasn’t sure where I’d gone wrong. I offset the blocks so they overhung inside the circle as much as I dared. All that accomplished was a straight wall slanting inwards. Never mind. Chalk it up to experience.

The boys, of course, came out to help. I was trying to fill the bucket with a shovel the size of the boys, while they were practically in the bucket, “helping” to fill it with shovels the size of a teacup. I alternated between worrying about burying them alive in snow or banging them on the head with the shovel, all the while frustrated they were in the way of my engineering accomplishment. If I’d known how that “accomplishment” would turn out, I might not have been so concerned.

The boys were fascinated by the project, and I hope it was as educational for them as it was for me. In the end they lost interest in the repetitive process (once you’ve filled and placed one snow block, you’ve seen them all) and went off to do their own thing in the snow. That suited me fine. By the third row I knew I wasn’t going to have a real igloo anyway, but I persevered and added another two rows, just for the fun of it.

Debbie came out and took photos. Daniel built snow radiators, placing them at careful intervals around the inside wall to “warm it up.” I pulled Joel around on his sled.

Later, I looked it up on the internet. I should have used a spiral technique. I should have made it bigger. I should have used bigger blocks.

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