The Life of a Gingerbread House

We received a gingerbread house kit from a dear friend this year.  A couple of days before Christmas we decided to give it a try.  Here were are...all ready to go!

(Yes, Cora is already sneaking a finger full of frosting.  And yes, Arden is in her pajamas.  But that is because it was "Polar Express" day at school.  Arden came home with a little golden ticket her teacher had given her, and was COMPLETELY convinced that she was going to be going on the really real Polar Express.  Like to the North Pole.  To see Santa.  I tried to manage her expectations a little and tell her that they were probably just going to pretend to go on the Polar Express, but she didn't believe me.  She was going to the North Pole.  She was actually really worried that when she was on the really real Polar Express, there wouldn't be a bathroom on the train.  :-)  She was a little let down that it turned out to be the pretend Polar Express, after all, but she was excited that she got to have some chocolate milk and an Oreo with red filling.  Just as good as a trip to the North Pole, right?  But back to our gingerbread...)

Here is the little house once we finally got it sticking together!  It took us a couple of tries to get this thing to stand up.  The only gingerbread houses I have made in the last 10 or so years have been made of graham crackers, which aren't very heavy.  Luckily, the frosting that came with this kit was just like superglue after a few minutes.  Cora still looks a little worried that the house might fall over.  Probably because if you look at it from her angle it was leaning pretty far.  But it stayed up!

 Dax was pretty uninterested in the gluing of the house, but once the candy came out he quickly found his way over to where we were and wanted to help.  The problem is that we took so long getting the house to stand up, that by the time the candy was getting put on the frosting was pretty much the consistency of cement.  Our house didn't look nearly as nice as the one on the box, but we had fun making it.  This is the picture where I said, "Smile for the camera and then you can eat the house."  Arden did great, but the other two couldn't keep their eyes off the prize...

 After a few more tries and a little bit of threatening, I finally got them to all look at the camera...maybe not smile at the camera, but at least they are looking...and licking their little chops in anticipation.

 Okay, kids...go for it:

 Here is Daxton eating the pine tree out front of the house.

I sooo meant to take a picture of the sad, broken down house completely stripped of all of its candy sitting in pieces on the counter that night, but I forgot.  You can picture it though.  This gingerbread house had a very short life.  But a very yummy one.