First Day of Spring Buries West Texas Under a Foot of Snow

Record snowfall is continuing into Spring as the normally sweltering deserts of western Texas get blasted by another record blizzard.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram held it's first-ever snowman contest, receiving more than 400 entries. Six received praise:

'Marshmallow Man' look-alike

Erick Thomas and family, Arlington

This snowman had staying power: seven days, to be exact. It's no wonder, at 13 feet tall and 10 feet wide (including the arms made out of 2-by-4's). Thomas, his daughters -- ages 8 and 5 -- and a neighbor worked on this mammoth man in Thomas' front yard for two days.

"We were just making a snowman and decided ... we might as well do it as big as we can," he said. The eyes are made of beer bottles and the mouth is made of charcoal.

It became a neighborhood tourist attraction. "A lot of people stopped by, got out and took photos," he said.

Think tank

Rosalie Kobetich, Lipan

"While passing the commode in our pasture -- which usually is filled with flowers -- the idea occurred to me to build The Thinker," says Kobetich, who is a painter and a member of the Weatherford Art Association. The 5-foot-3 snow sculpture took about 90 minutes to complete by herself and is adorned with a branch of pine needles.

"Unfortunately, he lost his head the next morning because it got pretty mushy out there," Kobetich said. "Too bad he didn't stay longer."

Snow warrior

Jim Walter, Burleson

"This is a statue of a Viking warrior standing on the deck of his long boat, but we didn't have enough snow for the boat," Walter says.

During the snowfall, Walter's family had six different snowman projects going on their pasture, and they were scrambling to complete them before the snow melted. The Viking was his idea. This menacing warrior, holding a spear in his left hand, eventually sunk back into history.

Cold sweat

Michael and Tammie Baker, Fort Worth



"My wife and I exercise together," says Michael Baker. "I run, and she follows me on her bike. We thought that our snow people should reflect our hobby, so we built a runner and a rider in front of our home."

This cardio-tastic snow couple are wearing the Bakers' own clothes and shoes (the race number is from last year's Cowtown Marathon) and using their own bike and ear buds. The hardest part was balancing the one on the bike.

So did they work out after they built their snow avatars? Baker laughed. "That was our exercise for the day."

Snow dragon

Sarah Blaido, Hurst

Sarah, 16, spent three days sculpting this dragon. The home-schooled high-school sophomore "really wanted to do a dragon because it's my favorite thing of all time," she said. She filled up big bins with dense, clean snow and built the rear first, then the middle and front sections. It measured 8 to 9 feet long.

Unfortunately, not many people got to see her creation before it melted. "On the last day, I was just putting on finishing touches when the sun came out, and it immediately started melting," she said.

Global warming protest

Curtis and Melissa Reeves, Weatherford "Thirty snowmen held a global warming protest in Weatherford," the Reeveses said in their clever entry. "The protest ran for two days before the crowd dissipated. No injuries were reported. However, the protesters did leave their signs on our sidewalk."

It took the husband-wife team a few hours to create this snowy scene; each snowman was about a foot tall. It looked especially neat when the candles were lit at night, they said. However, all the snowmen eventually fell victim to the warming trend.