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Building the Ultimate Snow Fort – The Beast on Our Front Lawn

By //  by Leslie Foster 9 Comments

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Our family loves winter.  Snow is awesomely-wonderfully-fun and versatile.  You can use it for snowball fights, skiing, snowshoeing, sledding, and snow angels. But most importantly, you can use it to build.

From the time our son was barely able to walk, my husband Dave was out there building forts (Who’s the bigger kid, eh?)  Afraid of collapsing tunnels, a real danger that takes the lives of a few children each winter, my husband diligently builds a wood structure upon which he piles snow.  It started small in the early years.  Really small.  But somehow, it has gotten out of hand over the last few years. 

Let me introduce you to The Beast on Our Front Lawn, otherwise known as the ultimate snow fort.

Ultimate Snow Fort, wood base, safe snow fort It makes its official appearance a few weeks before Christmas … standing naked … desperately waiting for snow.

Thankfully, the skies eventually open up giving us a little of the white stuff masking some of the beast’s hideousness!  Now this is a big structure requiring significant amounts of snow to cover it.  My husband used to tirelessly shovel for hours attempting to pile the snow and render the structure safe enough for all of the neighbourhood children to climb and slide on.

Ultimate snow fort, Buried Snow Fort, winter fun, sleep in a snow fort In years past, a neighbour with a snow blower (who must be a little bit crazy like us) would come and snow-blow our front lawn to help move things along.

But that wasn’t enough for my husband. He called in the heavy machines…seriously, check out the picture.

Ultimate snow fort, snow plow, snow blowerWe’ve since purchased a snow blower and the front lawn gets snow-blowed as regularly as the driveway!

Why does my husband go to all of this trouble you ask?  So that he and my son can spend a one-night-sleep-out in the fort.  Winter camping of sorts.

The week leading up to the sleep-out, there is a flurry of preparation.  Patch all of the holes in the ‘walls’.  Make sure that there are suitable pieces of cardboard or plywood to cover the entrance.  Contact friends with winter “gear” like ground covers, sleeping mats, winter sleeping bags, sleeping bag liners.  I kid you not, there’s a whole lot of stuff needed to make this sleep-out possible!

My husband strings white Christmas lights inside the fort to set the mood.  They pick a movie, make some popcorn and hot chocolate and head out for their annual one-night-sleep-out.

Ultimate Snow Fort, Hot cocoa in snow fort, sleep in snow fortSome years, they last until 1 or 2 am.  Last year, they made it all the way to 5:30am (which was deemed a huge success!)

So, Dave and my son are eagerly waiting for the weather to be just right.  They’re discussing movie selections.  There can’t be too much planning for such an undertaking.

Up until now, I have chosen to sleep cozily in my bed by myself *ahhhhh* while they freeze their butts off.  But this year, my husband built an extension (You think I jest?)  I have now heard the dreaded words from my son, “Mom, there’s lots of room for you too.”  How is a mother to refuse such an offer?  What do you think?  Should I suck it up and take one for the team!?

You might be interested in another fort we built last winter…

Ultimate snow fort, Block Castle, igloo,  You can read about how we built it and view a time lapse video here. 

 

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Filed Under: Family Fun Tagged With: family fun in the winter, safe snow forts for kids, sleep in a snow fort, winter fun

About Leslie Foster

A graduate of the MBA program at York University, Leslie pursued a career in Marketing and Communications for over a decade before leaving that world behind to become an entrepreneur. She is the creator of Ottawa’s uber-cool family entertainment and edutainment company Funatorium Exploriumfollow. She has always loved to write and started freelance writing for local Ottawa publications about three years ago. She writes about family, food, travel, and also dabbles in copywriting. Her dream is to retire as a travel writer … who wouldn’t want those perks! She is mom to an amazing son and wife to a pretty terrifc guy. She is a perpetual idea generator and believer of all things good in the world.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Katja

    February 11, 2015 at 11:40 am

    This is incredible! Crazy, but still so cool. My big kids would love this. I will stay toasty inside though.

    Reply
    • Leslie Foster

      February 11, 2015 at 2:16 pm

      Crazy is right!

      Reply
  2. peady

    February 11, 2015 at 12:06 pm

    This is INCREDIBLE!!!

    Wow! I wish you were my neighbour!

    Cool!

    I can’t wait to show my Things.

    Reply
    • Leslie Foster

      February 11, 2015 at 2:17 pm

      You can always visit 😉

      Reply
      • peady

        February 12, 2015 at 11:05 am

        I’d like that! My furry brown blanket of joy and I might move right in to enjoy the twinkly lights and read all the books! 😀

        Reply
  3. canthony2012

    February 11, 2015 at 12:12 pm

    What wonderful memories you’re making for your son!

    Reply
    • Leslie Foster

      February 11, 2015 at 2:17 pm

      That’s why we do it. We have a few other crazy things we do in the name of making memories!

      Reply
  4. Aneta Alaei (@HomeWithAneta)

    February 14, 2015 at 10:09 pm

    Candace this is all kinds of amazing that there is so much effort put into this. I like you would be in bed…unless there was wine (lots of it) and than who knows I might be all up building an extension myself.

    Reply
    • Aneta Alaei (@HomeWithAneta)

      February 14, 2015 at 10:09 pm

      I mean Leslie 🙂

      Reply

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