*Author’s Note: Yes, I realize it’s April. Shut up.*
I feel bad for my kids. I do. Every year I try to create a festive, stress-free holiday infused with the true spirit of Christmas and timeless family traditions.
What actually happens is this:
Someone (hint: not me) got the idea that it would be a good idea for us to try our hand at the time-honored Christmas craft of the Gingerbread House. In an effort to prove that I really am a good mother, I forged ahead, putting the Wee Jack down for a nap and setting up shop at the kitchen table with Em.
The end result is what you see above…the culinary equivalent of government-funded housing. The roof panels start sliding apart almost immediately and it pretty much went downhill from there. Oh, we made an attempt to festively decorate according to the picture on the box, but IMO we were doomed from the start. Combine a creativity challenged mother and a 9 year old with the attention span of, well, a 9 year old and you ain’t exactly looking at The Home & Garden Network. We gave up right about the time Em finished all the “good” candy parts, leaving the poor Gingerbastards whose home this was intended to be slumped despondently in front of their allegedly edible shack. I say allegedly because who the hell actually eats a Gingerbread house?
Jack, that is who. Unfortunately I failed to get a picture of the final indignity suffered by the above-mentioned residents of Potterville, but Jack certainly enjoyed himself. On the plus side I learned I would make an excellent slumlord.
It looks great to me. Doesn’t look like there’s any lizards in it, just sayin.’
It looks cute! Did Em have fun? That’s all that really matters!
I love Gingerbread any time of year.
Our Gingerbread houses never really got “decorated”– the kids always ate most of the candy before we even got to the “decorating” part ….
That’s what a gingerbread house is supposed to look like. It’s the memories that will make it perfect.
Keep writing, Amy! Please.
Pretty darn cute, I’d say. And you did it with no help from Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac!
One Christmas, my eldest daughter and her then-boyfriend built a cathedral out of gingerbread, complete with stained glass windows. But the warmth of the room softened up the icing that was holding it together, and right before we were supposed to eat dinner, it collapsed. My daughter promptly had a nervous breakdown and our Christmas dinner was ruined. Moral of story: sometimes it just doesn’t pay to dream big.