When the snow starts to fall, most children rush outside to build a snowman or have a snowball fight.

But Chris Maher Loughnan and his children, Amber, six, and Dylan, eight, went one better and built an igloo in their garden.

With the help of neighbour Katie Davey, 11, they filled a washing-up bowl with snow and squashed it to make the building blocks.

Then, in true Arctic style, they stacked them on top of each other to form the igloo shape. The operation took about two-and-a-half hours.

Chris, of Southdown Farm, Hassocks, said: "I built one when I was a child and I remembered how to do it.

"It is surprisingly quick to do and the kids thought it was really neat. They have been playing in it ever since.

"It is not very big but you can get two or three kids inside at a time.

"It's still frozen at the moment. It melts a bit in the day but freezes again at night.

"If we get a bit more snow we are going to make an even bigger one for the adults."