The Gingerbread House

Right around Thanksgiving I got a catalog from King Arthur Flour full of yummy looking mixes and all kinds of baking tools and pans that I lust over but can't justify. (I have a tiny kitchen and no room for bakeware that I'd use once or twice a year - but I want them all the same.) On the very first page of the catalog was a gingerbread house kit and of course they showed it in their perfect gingerbread house glory. Grant saw it and did one of his most dramatic gasps to date then looked at me and said "I need make that."

And so began my quest to find us a gingerbread house kit (because I wasn't brave enough to give it a go from scratch). It didn't take long. Those things are everywhere during the holidays and my mother-in-law picked one up for us on a great Black Friday sale. Made by Wilton it had everything we needed to put out gingerbread house together.

It was about 3 weeks ago that Grant and I put it together. He loves to help in the kitchen and was actually a part of a lot of my Christmas baking endeavors, so I knew he'd love a project that was just for him. I trimmed the pieces while Grant snuck the crumbs into his mouth. Then I put the house together with the frosting. After that was the real party:

He kept telling me "More candy! More! More!"

When we were all done he yelled "We did it!"

So proud of himself!

Grant and I had so much fun with this little project. He was so funny to watch and kept asking me "I can't eat it, right?" I guess we started a little tradition with this because I'm already looking forward to doing it next year! The tough part was last weekend when we told him that Christmas was over the house had to go bye-bye. The look on his face was awful. Like we just crushed his favorite monster truck in front of him. It was pretty sad.

BUT also last weekend at BJs I found a gingerbread man decorating kit (contains 3 kits!) and I plan to surprise Grant with that one weekend soon. And he'll really like that because we'll be able to eat it.