Look to many of history's cultural symbols, and there you'll find an ancestor of Frosty, the snowman in the movie Frozen. It appeared on some of the first postcards, starred in some of the earliest silent movies, and was the subject of a couple of the earliest photos, dating all the way back to the 1800s. I discovered even more about one of humanity's earliest forms of life art during several years of research around the world.

For example, snowmen were a phenomenon in the Middle Ages, built with great skill and thought. At a time of limited means of expression, snow was like free art supplies dropped from the sky. It was a popular activity for couples to leisurely walk through town to view the temporary works of chilly art. Some were created by famous artists, including a 19-year-old Michelangelo, who in 1494 was appointed by the ruler of Florence, Italy, to build a snowman in his mansion's courtyard.

The Miracle of 1511 took place during six freezing works called the Winter of Death. The city of Brussels was covered in snowmen—an impressive scene that told stories on every street corner. Some were political in nature, criticizing the church and government. Some were a reflection of people's imagination. For the people of Brussels, this was a defining moment of defining freedom. At least until spring arrived, by which time they were dealing with damaging floods.

           If you fear the heyday of the snowman has passed, don't worry:  I've learned that some explosive snowman history is still being made today. Every year since 1818, the people of Zurich, Switzerland, celebrate the beginning of spring by blowing up a snowman. On the third Monday of April, the holiday Sechselauten is kicked off when a cotton snowman called the Boogg is stuffed with explosive and paraded through town by bakers and other tradesmen who throw bread to the crowds. The parade ends with the Boogg being placed on a 40-foot pile of firewood. After the bells of the Church of St. Peter have rung six times, representing the passing of winter, the pile is lit. When the snowman explodes, winter is considered officially over—the quicker it is burnt down, the longer summer is said to be.

    I received a call today asking if I would be willing to bring food to a family in need. The mother was having a major operation and would be lying down for several weeks. Of course, I responded with an immediate Yes!

    As I planned the meal in my head, I reflected on how many times over the years I had been asked to prepare food. I have done so countless times with a very open heart. But the truly amazing thing is that I have received double over the course of my life. When my mother passed away, our house was filled with fresh dinners for weeks. A woman from the church of our community stopped by each evening with some food. The gift of food was her small way of trying to ease our pain. Later in my life, when I was on bed rest during my pregnancy with twins, women of the church again stepped in to help. They arranged babysitting for my two-year-old daughter, and brought lovely dinners to our house. Even when I was put in the hospital, my husband would bring cooked meals to my hospital room. How we relied on these dinners to feed my tired husband and young daughter. Food is all about comfort. It feeds our bodies, but it can also feed our souls. When you hear people talking about their favourite holidays, it usually includes their feelings connected with sharing food. I know that I will have many more opportunities in my lifetime to prepare food for others. It is truly a gift I want to prepare and deliver to someone in need.

    The Chinese invented paper in 105 A. D. They mixed the bark of a tree and rags (破布) with water, put a screen into the mixture, and lifted out a thin piece of wet paper. They dried the paper in the sun.

    The Chinese kept their secret of how to make paper until a war with Muslims in the ninth century. The art of papermaking soon spread throughout the Muslim world.

    The Mayan Indians in Central America and Pacific Islanders also discovered how to make paper, but their knowledge never spread to the rest of the world.

    For centuries, all paper was made by hand. Rags were the main material. Then a French scientist discovered that people could make paper from wood, too. Finally, in the eighteenth century. a Frenchman invented a machine to make paper from wood.

    We may be only three weeks into December, but artist Jonnie Hartman has been in the holiday spirit for months, designing and building the Grand America Holiday Window Stroll.

The goal with each window stroll is to create playful and uplifting displays (展示), according to Hartman. "I really try to do something lighthearted, something whimsical, that is, something everyone can connect with and maybe not see every day in the real world," Hartman said.

    She designs all of the window displays by hand, starting with pencil sketches, then illustrating the designs on her computer and sending parts of the drawings to be printed. From there, Hartman works with a team of five people to build the displays, creating, sewing and embellishing (润色) many elements by hand.

    However, a challenge Hartman has faced over the years as she has designed the displays is making sure all of the measurements are right for elements to fit inside the windows.

"When I was in college, I was an art major, and I thought, 'I don't need math. I will never use it. I'm an artist,' and guess what, it's the most important thing that I use, ''Hartman said. "If I don't get that right, then the windows don't fit, the pieces don't come together and it just doesn't work out."

    The holiday window stroll gives Hartman a unique opportunity to hear feedback from those who observe her creations, which is something she doesn't always get to experience with her other artworks. She said it's fun to hear people's reactions as they go through the holiday window stroll.

"It just makes me happy that I can kind of set the tone for people's holiday season and just maybe bring a smile to their face," Hartman said.

    You may laugh it off if someone told you that extreme weather disasters were actually a child's tricks. But El Nino, meaning “little boy” in Spanish, could be about to cause trouble

    A recent statement from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned ofa strong El Nino event that may be similar to the strongest in modern times. Scientists believe that evidence shows a more than 90 percent chance that it is coming — and it's going to be big. “If this lives up to its potential, this thing can bring a lot of floods, mudslides（泥石流）, and trouble,” said Bill Patzert, a NASA scientist.

    El Nino is a climate event occurring in the Pacific Ocean. The wind usually blows strongly from east to west due to the rotation（旋转）of the Earth. This causes water to pile up in the Western Pacific and pulls up colder water from the boom in the eastern part. However, in El Nino years, the winds pushing the water get weaker and cause the warmer water to shift back toward the east. This warms the ocean as it travels before finally reaching the shores of North and South America. In an El Nino event, the waters of the eastern Pacific can be up to 4 degrees Celsius warmer than usual.

    Most El Ninos last from 9 to 12 months and their effects are felt around December. They don't happen every year though, usually between every two to seven years.

    Last seen in 1997-98, El Nino caused severe droughts in Australia, the Philippines and Indonesia, as well as deadly floods in Peru and Ecuador. The world also heats up during an ElNino-1998 became the warmest year on record at the time. If the current trend continues, 2015 is almost certainly to become the hottest year yet again.

    A strong El Nino also affects hurricane seasons around the planet. The warmer the Eastern Pacific is, the more hurricanes it gets. The Western Pacific, on the other hand, tends to see more and stronger typhoons.

    The weather isn't the only thing that's affected. Warmer surface waters in the Eastern Pacific make the cold-water fish swim away and damage the fishing industry in much of Latin America.

Singapore researchers say they have developed a form of electronic skin that can create a sense of touch. They hope their invention will give people with prosthetic hands (假肢手) the ability to identify different objects.

The skin device measures 1 square centimeter. The system contains 100 small sensors that attempt to recreate things like texture (质地), temperature and even pain. The researchers call the device Asynchronous Coded Electronic Skin, or ACES, which can process information faster than humans' nervous system. Machine learning methods trained the device to recognize 20 to 30 different textures. It can even correctly read Braille letters most of the time, the researchers say.

The system does not require the users' movement to work. Humans need to slide to feel texture. But in this case the skin, with just a single touch, is able to detect textures of different roughness.

A demonstration showed that the device could identify the difference between a soft ball and a solid plastic one. "When you lose your sense of touch, you essentially become numb and prosthetic users face that problem, " said Benjamin Tee, leader of the research team. "So by recreating an artificial version of the skin, for their prosthetic devices, they can hold a hand and feel the warmth and feel that it is soft."

Tee said his idea for the device came from the movie Star Wars, when character Luke Skywalker loses his right hand and it is replaced with a robotic one. In the film, the new hand is able to experience touch sensations just like the real one.

The artificial skin technology is still going through experiments and development. But Tee said there had already been a lot of interest in the system, especially from the medical community. Tee said similar inventions that his team has developed include see-through skin that can repair itself when torn and a material for wearable electronic devices that gives off light.