As Martha Jokela sorts through the pots and pans in her kitchen she is sizing them up for something other than a cooking project. The retired Anchorage teacher has a new hobby. The kitchenware will become molds filled with colored water and frozen into icy shapes.

Jokela puts her pots and pans outside where cold temperatures will turn them into ice bricks in no time. On a given day her driveway is filled with containers in various stages of deep freeze.

“Wastepaper baskets, yogurt containers, even balloons work great,” says Jokela.

Jokela unmolds her ice blocks for use in making colorful ice sculptures. She plants them on an icy base then squirts cold water from a turkey baster. It freezes quickly, acting like glue to cement the pieces together.

Some of Jokela’s creations are small, some of them tall. Some are planted in whiskey barrels on her deck while others sit right on the snowy ground.

Jokela is the first to say that she has become obsessed with her new hobby creating gifts that will last all winter long for family and friends.

“Most of my friends don’t need more stuff,” says Jokela. “They can put these outside where they will keep all winter and then disappear, you don’t have to figure out where to put them. They are the perfect Christmas present.”