Gingerbread Houses

This was the third year in a row that Reese had asked for one of those gingerbread house kits. Meh, I thought. If we're going to make a gingerbread house, we're doing it old school. Graham Crackers. Gooey icing. Tons of candies. Fighting as it falls fifty times into a gooey lump.

I figured, a kit? How lame!

Let me just say one word. Wrong!

I caved in a bought the $9.99 kit at WalMart when I was shopping one morning without Reese. I figured I'd surprise him with something he really wanted!

The kit contained pre-pressed/baked gingerbread parts for the house along with a man, woman, & tree shape. Plus a tube of icing & bags of various candies. There's no way I could have purchased all these parts for under $10.

And it came with the most nifty idea ever...a tray with little reservoirs to put icing into...it holds up your walls of the house so they don't fall!

The "icing" isn't really tasty icing. It's heavy on the corn starch, which makes for some great gingerbread house glue, but not so good for eating. The candies, however, were tasty!

Reese was really cracking me up with his design plan. His gingerbread house needed to look exactly like the one pictured on the box. Including the pattern of colored candies, the placement of certain types of sweets, & the number and order of colors of buttons on the gingerbread man!

I kept trying to encourage him to make his gingerbread house any way he wants. It doesn't have to look like the picture on the box at all! But he was steadfast in his design choices, so I began to look at it in a different light. This was some good work in visual skills and memory skills! Using the house on the box as a model, Reese picked the candies that matched, the colors that matched, & placed them the same way. If it wasn't the most creative house from his brain, it was at least a good opportunity to practice some visual skills! :)

These lovely things kept rolling all over the floor....

Luckily, Zoe the Wonder Dog thought manna was raining from Heaven and happily crunch-crunch-crunched her way around the table as we decorated...

Reese loved his finished product, and Mommy thought the gingerbread house kit was pure genius. Nothing fell. Nothing dripped. It was a very easy, fun craft project!

**And for what it's worth, the gingerbread cookie recipe tastes good. Reese has eaten the chimney, the Gingerbread Man's head, & the corner of the roof!