Each year it is a Hancock family tradition to make and decorate gingerbread men to leave out for Santa. This year as the kids are older I thought we could also make gingerbread houses to decorate as well.
As I didn’t have cutters for the house I found some templates on line and printed these out to use. We went around to my Mum’s house again to do the baking and decorating as her kitchen is bigger, and nice and light to take some photos in.
The kids had fun rolling out the dough and making the gingerbread men and houses. As this was the first time we had made gingerbread houses I decided to let them decorate the house, and then put it together at the end. We did one house, and they had half each to decorate.
They love the decorating part, putting on different sorts of lollies to make windows and doors. Once they had finished the house, they started on their gingerbread men. Emme went for the pink and girly look, while Mason tried to make his look like zombies!!
I then started to build the house…..and this is when things started to go downhill!!! I used royal icing and glued the house together, and it lasted only long enough to take some quick photos before falling into a heap. If I had been at home I would have grabbed one of the kids dinosaurs, and put it in the middle and blamed it on the dinosaur!!!
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, and next year I will have a better plan.
1. Research, research and research
2. Overcook each piece and leave overnight so they are rock hard
3. Glue each piece and leave to dry before adding the next piece…yes, hindsight is a great thing
4. Or….buy a premade house, and not have to worry about steps 1,2 and 3.
So I have a year to plan the gingerbread house, fingers crossed for better luck than.
Mason having fun decorating his gingerbread.
Emme having fun with the decorating
The 2 minute gingerbread house.....
