Gingerbread, Mostly

We made our annual gingerbread houses in mid-December, the 14th, to be exact (I only know this because my camera dates pictures, lol).  We had bunches of fun and tried out all sorts of awesome things, including a gingerbread mold (going to buy another one next year, so I can alternate them as I'm baking; NEVER going back to cutting out patterns), a shortbread house (making more of those next year, too), and a chocolate house (I didn't like the way the chocolate got a film coating on it, maybe next year try white chocolate?).  And of course, on Christmas day, we participated in our annual gingerbread house smashing.  Except I forgot to take pictures.  I should have, because the kids got way creative.  Rex ran over his with his bike, and Caleb and Hannah shot their with bow and arrows.

Mom's shortbread house.

Mom and Dad's chocolate house.  Completed after all the candy was gone.

Waiting for the fun to really start.

Lizzi was an angel, letting Sam help with her house.  He loved it!!

Hannah with Nana.

Hannah says hers was a Georgian house, as in why put snow around it when the grass is always green here?

After working on Lizzi's house, Sam very studiously added like a million lemon drops to his own house.

Finished products.

Halfway done.

Whoa!  Mucho frosting.  Sariah was very pleased with hers.

You can't see it in this pic, but on Rex's house, Santa was having some serious issues with the chimney.

Santa brought Lizzi's house a gingerbread baby.  Don't ask me why.  Idk.

Santa is falling off the roof on Caleb's house.  Santa had a bad night at our gingerbread house factory.  Just sayin.

Birthday Fun & General Goofing Off

The birthday boy turned 10 and we celebrated, followed by orange-frosting inspired goofing off.  Oh, and Hannah "posed" for pictures with Dad.

Tomorrow...

...we celebrate!

In the with New, out with the Old....

A mixed metaphor, to be sure, but you'll soon see why.

Traditions are part of the building blocks of strong families, or so I've heard. Our family certainly cannot be an exception to this. We have a very special New Year's Day tradition. I'm going to outline it for you step by step.

First, in the month of December, we build the most amazing gingerbread houses. Okay, well, this year we didn't build them, but we did decorate them.




Next, we either (a) admire them for a few weeks, or (b) ask Mom and Dad about 50 times a day when we can eat the candy off of the beautimous houses, or (c) wish we'd given the houses away like we'd planned on.

At long last, the Mom and the Dad say, "If you can pry the candy off the houses and think that it would taste fine, please be our guests, and eat the candy. (And good luck prying it off your teeth later!)"



And at long last, we take the houses outside into the January cold. (This is Oklahoma, people.)



And we smash them to smithereens because it's totally awesome!



Hey, we're building a strong family here!