Yahoo News Retiree Makes Wooden Snowmen for Everyone in Town: ‘It Brought the Community Together’
Pauline Parker started "Project Snowflake" in July, and has been spreading cheer ever since
Courtesy of Pauline Parker
Pauline Parker's wooden snowmen in WyomingPauline Parker started building snowmen in July — no snow needed!
Her goal was to make a personalized, nearly life-sized custom snowman for every person who lives in her town of Burlington, Wyoming (population 314).
While recovering from knee surgery, Parker, 65, launched what she dubbed “Project Snowflake,” making the first 40 snowmen by painting on wooden cutouts. To date she has made about 500 snowmen that she has placed near the front doors of the town's 142 homes — and to people in neighboring towns who've heard about her work and requested some, too.
Some are four feet tall and four feet wide. “A few of them are quite big,” she says. "If a family had eight children, I did individual snowmen and hooked them all together."
But thankfully, she had help: A classroom of kindergartners and 20 members of the local 4-H helped her paint. The town's graduating high school seniors painted 18 snowflakes to accompany her work.
Courtesy of Pauline Parker
Pauline Parker's wooden snowmen in Wyoming“It brought our community together,” she says.
In the time since the delivery (which took three days!), Parker has enjoyed the feedback she's received from friends and neighbors.
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One family used their snowmen as their holiday card. “That makes me happy that people are enjoying them,” she says. "It's just fun."
Parker even launched a 20-snowman scavenger hunt that ran throughout December. “You have to really search for some of them,” she says. People who found them all were invited to drop by her house for a reward — in the form of a chocolate snowman.
Courtesy of Pauline Parker
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"The people from our community are wonderful people. And they're just excited," Parker says of the project. "I just love Christmas. It should be a time of smiles and happiness and I think this has helped our community with that."
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