In the age of Pinterest, everyone wants to try ambitious DIY projects—sometimes to the dismay of their spouse.
When John McPhee was approached by his wife to build a colourful igloo made of milk cartons, the Slave Lake man agreed—mainly because he didn’t expect the idea to come to fruition. His wife found the project on Pinterest, and according to its instructions she’d need 500 milk cartons.
To create the colourful igloo, milk cartons need to be filled with a mixture of food colouring and water before being frozen into multi-coloured blocks of ice. They’re then cemented in place with a little “snowcrete” (a simple mixture of snow and water).
“I didn’t want to build it, but I figured she wouldn’t be able to find 500 milk cartons,” McPhee told CBC News.
Unfortunately, he underestimated just how resourceful his wife is.
She posted call-outs on various Facebook pages, asking for spare two-litre milk cartons in the Slave Lake area, and managed to gather all 500 in just 10 days.
McPhee stayed true to his word and began building the multi-coloured igloo. He isn’t the first to attempt an igloo like this, but the weather didn’t make it easy for him. Temperatures rose above zero in the midst of his project, forcing McPhee to put a tarp overtop to lock in the cold and keep the sun off it.
In total, the project took him 120 hours. His wife was excited to see the final product, though he told reporters that their two young kids—10-year-old Tristan and six-year-old Mason—lost a lot of interest, “given the thing’s taken so long to build.”
McPhee later admitted that he had some fun building it, but he’s still happy to have it over with.
“I’ve earned my couch time,” he said.
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