curiosities

I got up this morning, looked out the window and saw that the latest snow storm had sprinkled more magical goodness on the streets. The storm had just started yesterday and overnight had covered the streets twice to transform the town into a winter wonderland. 

I got a crazy idea. It all started with WOOLY WILLY. WOOLY WILLY (below) is a retro game where magnetic shavings can be moved with a magnetic wand to add ‘hair’ to a bald character. I didn’t want it anymore and had thought, days prior, to just strategically place it out on the streets for someone to find and enjoy it-to give WOOLY WILLY a second life. I had thought about just placing it outside, but hadn’t, and WOOLY WILLY was just laying on the floor… Then, I saw the snowscape in the morning and that’s where inspiration struck! The view outside looked like a well-staged Christmas scene. I knew that I had a roll of Christmas wrapping paper still left over from the Holidays, along with tags, ribbon, etc. I thought it would be neat to build little snowmen through the city streets with gifts like WOOLY WILLY, because it’s so much more fun to unwrap something that to just find it-I feel. So it began. 

 A small trip to the store and a couple of bucks later I had, Bunny Paratroopers, Spiderman and Dora bubble-making kits, a movie trivia game, all of which were each around the price of a dollar. The only thing I ’splurged’ on was SCULPTURADES (blue box above $4.99)- the supplemental game piece for the game CRANIUM, where players get a card with a word and then have to try to sculpt what is on the card; for other players to guess. I tried to keep the costs of this mission low and make it more about the experience, but I’m a sucker for things that encourage creativity! On top of those gifts, I added a little inked doodle to the gift batch along with a 98 cent frame.

My roommate was home because his work at the neighborhood school had been cancelled because of the snow. He heard the sound of tape whirring and wrapping paper crinkling coming from my room and asked what I was up to. I told him what I was planning and he wanted to come along. 

photo by Chris Robinson

Originally a solo mission, it helped that he came along because at one point, when I was making a snowman, I was attacked by snowball snipers from a high-rise building and hadn’t even noticed. My roommate saved my life! I guess the kids home from school had some inspiration of their own.

This was the first small snowman set up. It was near our place by this walkway where the trees and the weight of the snow had formed an icy cavernous path. I set up the first little guy there. I was hoping for someone to stumble along and notice the little snowman if they were paying attention, but could just as easily pass it up.

I didn’t have much for decorating other that twigs and pieces from an abandoned, trashed, purple umbrella, which I cut to make scarf pieces out of.

Some snowmen sported a straw hat (my roommate’s idea, after I ran out of head wear!)

Some snowmen even had fashionable bottle cap hats…

And towards the end, some hardly had anything at all. I had ran out of props!

photo by Chris Robinson

photo by Chris Robinson

We had fun doing the mission and I just hope people have fun finding them!

~Rhode

 

 

 

 

This entry was posted on Friday, February 26th, 2010 at 8:54 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.