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Sorry John, I should have added the disclaimer that my comments only apply to Edinburgh and the Lothians- Where its bright, sunny and FREEZING this morning, snow is forecast to start around lunchtime and continue to fall till tomorrow night here... we wait with baited breath!
According to facebook Manchester is all but closed this morning.

Great day for some photos then!

Er...snow! Six inches when I left for work, eight inches when I finally made it home again, three hours later...then had to clear the carpark space in order to get the car back into it's space (I nearly abandoned it half-parked in all honestness!).

Yes JR, it is indeed a great day for photos.

To amend my previous estimations we are now up to at least six and a half inches here and it's still coming down.

2.5 hours from Stockport to Manchester. 0.5 hours across town to my work. The Nursery is now closing its doors due to a lack of transportation for its staff and I have to go and collect the Millie. Bummer. What a wasted day.

Well I say wasted. My team had an honourable mention in the BDP snowman building competition which has just occured in the car park opposite our office. Who said Architects did not know how to have fun?! The real bummer is that the Sustainability Team work the competition! Engineers, how do they win in the Architect's competition!?

I didn't actually make it as far as the office today it took me an hour and a half to get about 3 miles on the M62 so came off at the first junction i got to and went home. Luckily I had already planned for this and had work on my thumbstick. I doubt I'll be in tomorrow either as its now 25cm deep up here in Chadderton and snowing heavily again! Bring It on! time for more lovely snow pic's tommorow me thinks.

Still snowing heavily here - I reckon it's been nearly another inch since 11ish.

I've now got a serious urge to make an igloo. I've made a snowman but I want to do something I've never done before

[Edit] And I've just gone and done it. Ray Mears eat your heart out!

We need photographs of your Architectural marvel.

Sarcy bugger, I will post them up when
a) I know how to on here
b) I find the USB attachment cable for camera some time tomorrow.

I tried to do it properly, well, as properly as you can do with the materials I had in hand and the country I was in. I used a tray (that you'd probably recognise from primary school that held pencil crayons in) and packed the snow in to create my blocks - ingenuity! I also trimmed/cut them with a knife - I saw this on Mears and it is invaluable especially when you are creating the dome. As I was the only one doing it I was pretty impressed with my effort as I was unable to do a dome like one on the Florence Catherdral - mine just sort of rises a little too high - and I obviously had to make it thinner because of lack of snow, time, depth of the ice bricks and the fact that I didn't have anyone standing in the middle to pass stuff to and help to compact and strengthen my bricks - I'm hoping with the expected cold weather that it will knit together. I must say that it was very interesting to construct, I know it sounds geeky but I really did learn and realise an awful lot of stuff that I can remember for when I have a child. Incidentally, I know it is a long shot, but if it is still up and you can be bothered, Millie is more than welcome anytime to sample my building techniques. On a side note, it's really warm inside them.

GOOD SKILLS!!
I built one as a teenager, we had 18inches of snow, so I put it to good use. I found it abit complex, but as Im sure Andy will attest, with trial and error you can get something REALLY awesome.

On a side note, we also made anatomically correct (and rather explicit) snowmen and women on a local village green whilst at uni... it made the scottish national papers. Apparently the local parents weren't too impressed at seeing a snowman 68+1 and their kids asking why the snow man had fallen over? Another good trick is to create two snow rabbits... then the next night several more.... then more.... Not that I'm condoning such actions when there are igloos to be built. I just wish we had more snow. I've been told that I have no chance of a snow day unless we get about 18inches... and even then I'll be expected to walk in, check the lab, feed everything and then go home!

Andy wrote:Sarcy bugger

I was being serious. Oh well. Would still like to see the Photographs when they are available.

Phil - Like the idea about the snow bunnies. We made a snow turtle at work today.

Oh sorry, I must have listened far too much to Rowenna's comments and seen her looks as I proudly announced that it was finished at around 6pm today. To be fair, it's not that great to marvel at unless you've built it!

Does it look anything like this??

There are several snowmen in West Didsbury tonight...including one which is about six foot tall! I'll take a photo if I get a snow day tomorrow...too cold tonight!

stimpsonslostson wrote:Does it look anything like this??

Don't you mean this igloo?. You link takes us to a fence!

Also here are a couple of photographs of the lesser spotted snow tortoise (and mike involved in protecting said tortoise from attack). Interestingly I did not recognise myself for a second in one of these, does not look much like me. These will be replaced with proper images later!