Introducing... "Gloria", The Snow Mermaid

Anyone in the Kansas City area knows a couple of nights ago we received about 1-2 inches of snow. It was enough to call most schools out. But luckily not ours!!! My children were so mad, but I sure wasn't. Last week they had 2 days off from school and the week before that they had Friday off. Of course they will be home this Monday for the holiday. I'm telling you that our children are always out of school, especially 3rd quarter. You are probably thinking, "What kind of Mom are you that you don't want your kids home". When they are home from school I usually have at least 4-5 extra kids in my house to: feed, continuously ask them to clean up their messes, trying to sneak food in their rooms, and worse of all they take over the computer. But I love all of those "extra" kids, so I can't complain.

The snow we got was perfect for making snowmen or having a snowball fight. None of which my children did. But last night I couldn't sleep. Have you ever had one of those nights when you just can't settle down to sleep? I seem to have them very often, but last night was different. Instead of curling up on our warm comfy sofa, with the TV remote, a big glass of water, pillows, and at least two comforters...I went outside at around 10:00pm and started playing in the snow. I had on my slippers, no coat, just a scarf, and mittens. The worst part about it was I was in my pajamas. But I was so excited to go out there and dig into that snow that I didn't care.

I tried to get my oldest daughter, Sarah-Kate, to come outside with me, but she said it was too cold (Whatever!) My husband, Mike, wasn't home because he works weird hours. None of that stopped me from going outside to try to make something out of that perfect white icy snow. Even if it was very dark, and I couldn't see very well, or the fact I didn't have a shovel to help move the snow. I went into the garage and started looking through Mike's tools. I found exactly what I needed...a big squeegee thing. He uses it when he washes out the garage floor and it pushes the water out. Basically a big windshield wiper on a stick. I moved some snow and got started.

First I made a big ball of snow thinking I was going to make a snowman. But everyone makes snowmen with the carrot for a nose and stones for his eyes. I didn't want to do that, I didn't want to be like everyone else. I guess you could say I'm a bit competitive. I was looking at my big white cold snowball and knew that a regular snowman would not do our family and house justice. So my brain juices started running, and I decided I was going to make an octopus out of this ball. I started making the tentacles, two actually, and realized I forgot if they have eight or twelve tentacles. So that was out. Then I thought I would make a spider instead. I knew spiders only had 8 legs and I was going to use black shiny glass beads for the eyes. But how many eyes? Then I started second guessing myself and was thinking spiders only have six legs. That sounded wrong too, so I gave up on that idea.

After one hour outside I had a third idea. I was going to make a person look like they were buried in the snow. Like in that episode of "Friends" when Joey gets buried in the sand, but has boobs. That is what I was going to do. The two tentacles were transformed into arms and away I went. After awhile I realized I didn't like that idea either, but left the "arms". It was getting close to two hours outside, then...

Finally, I GOT IT!!!! After being in the snow with just a scarf, mittens, and my slippers I knew what I was going to make. I was going to make a full bodied MERMAID!!!! So I formed the body, it took awhile because our dog, Boo, kept running through her fins. I perfectly formed the body and tail. I even smoothed out the body, tail, made her head smaller, and made BOOBS! I knew I couldn't keep "Gloria the Snow Mermaid" naked because we have neighbors with young kids...so back to the garage for supplies.

I had a bag full of leis, and two different kinds of grass skirts. I bought them for a Hula Party we never had. I pulled out a sparkly green hula skirt for her hair. When I did that I knew I made the right decision to make a mermaid, plus it was now about two or more hours I have been outside. I used two blue flowers from a lei for the eyes and red flowers for the mouth. I was almost done. The only thing left would be the coconut shells to go over the boobs. At that time all I could think of was that Heidi girl from "The Hills", and how she wanted size "H" implants for "Heidi". Since I was the snow plastic surgeon I was going to make these boob big...real big.

I didn't even think about the size of them until I went to put the shells on her naked private pieces parts. The shells didn't even come close to fitting. I guess I might have a bit of an obsession with snow boobs, or the power to make them any size I want. I had to take snow off the top of them and shove those shells on her. I'm talking packing them in. I have to say I'm pretty proud of Gloria, even if her face does look like Tammy Faye Bakker with green sparkly hair. Last night was so fun, I felt like I did back in Youngstown, OH. We always had snow like this, but better.