Gingerbread house

Every year we make a gingerbread house on Christmas Eve.  I think we started the tradition when Kiddo was about 2.  Christmas Eve is a very long day when you are a little person.  Making the house can be done in lots of little  steps and takes most of the day.

We made the dough the night before.  The little kid looks through books and picks the kind of house she wants to make.  This year we downloaded a pattern from: Ultimate Gingerbread Elf House.  Google rocks.  You can find anything.

I roll out the dough on the backs of the cookie sheets.  It works pretty well.  But, typically at this point I am really wishing that we had just bought a kit.  Rolling and cutting out pieces is a pain and I usually have a few dozen other things that I need to do.  I invariably forget to cut out the windows before baking and have to do it quick when they come out of the oven.

I broke part of the roof!

Once they have cooled, construction begins.  Last year the icing did not harden and we had a collapse during construction.  This year, I got a tiny bit of egg yolk in there and worried that the royal icing would not come to stiff peaks.  I'm not sure it really did, but it worked.

We use cans to ensure stability during the set up phase.  Once the icing has hardened, we go to town decorating.  I don't have fancy decorating stuff.  I pipe the icing out of the clipped corner of a plastic bag.  I do the piping, she does the decorating.  We use candy and cereal to decorate.  She has a blast.  Actually, so do I.

No matter what happens we always decide that it is the prettiest house we have ever seen.

The Front

The side and back

Dumping mini red hots all over the roof works well.

Gummy Bears are making snow angels in the front yard.

This is a tradition that makes our house a home.  Merry Christmas!