Every year I buy the gingerbread house kits from the supermarket. They’re easy and tons of fun (when you’re not yelling at the kids to stop eating all the candies). This year all our ‘gingerbread crafting fun’ took place under the super-happy SNL Gumby Christmas slogan, that I unhappily drew yesterday. Naughtiness, therefore, was kept to a dull roar. No-one likes to have their lungs ripped out while crafting (or ever for that matter).
A couple of days ago, I noticed Cookie Magazine was having a gingerbread house contest and I figured it would be fun for Lizzy and I to enter. I am sure there will be all kinds of marvelous Marthas out there who bake their own gingerbread and create multi-storey ginger mansions that will make our ‘frosted mini-Wheat’ thatched cottage pale in comparison. I’m afraid, I am a ‘kit’ kind of girl and keeping it simple means less stress and more fun.
Notes: We added our own additional red and white candies and frosted mini-wheats to the Safeway Gingerbread House Kit. Those big red feet next to the chimney are Santa’s foot prints, idea courtesy of Sam.
I saw this thatched roof idea on a magazine cover last week … I think it was Nigella Lawson, but I searched and searched, and couldn’t find the magazine again when I went frosted mini-wheat shopping.
My only regret is that I didn’t make one more trip to the store to buy the fruit roll-ups to do the stained glassed windows, maybe next year.
If you are wondering why my Gingerbread house is outside, well the lighting in my house is bloody horrible. I haven’t taken a decent photo after 1 pm, since October. I wanted a 1/2 decent photo for the contest, so I waited until daylight and carried it out on to the back deck. Silly, but necessary.
Of course, we couldn’t leave Sam and Georgia out (and we couldn’t have them help!).
This is the Midnight Express to Candyland. I was so immersed in my own creation, that I gave up ownership of the sacred icing bag to Sam. They had tons of fun.
See the lighting? Horrible …
I want to see your gingerbread creations, if you have photos, post the links below. It doesn’t have to be this years. If you don’t have a gingerbread masterpiece, feel free to rave about mine :)
MK xo
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