Ultimate Gingerbread House Cook-off!!

My cousins came over today! We were looking for something to do, and in a moment of serendipity, we found some old gingerbread house kits from two Christmases ago. This discovery triggered the event that took the rest of the afternoon: the ultimate gingerbread cook-off!

We organized teams oldest vs. youngest, so Lucas and I against my sister and Gianni. The goal was to build the coolest gingerbread house, there was no set time (although my sister finished long before we did and was getting impatient, so she started setting timers).

No part of these gingerbread houses were edible. They smelled like stale gingerbread and old sugar, like the inside of the Cracker Barrel store. (Don't ask how I made that connection. I'm just weird like that.) I mean, it didn't smell bad, but the powdered sugar was rock-hard, so we didn't think we should be eating it.

Anny and Gianni made a beach resort decorated for Christmas. It was equipped with a golf course, roof-top pool, bench-press equipment (which I thought was adorable--I took a close-up shot), and what they called a croquet field for their "garden gnome" guests. My sister has a thing for garden gnomes. I feel confident in declaring them the winners. Theirs was adorable and so imaginative. Lucas' and mine was a very traditional ginger bread house. No accommodations for mythical creatures. I guess once you hit 13-years-old, you get too practical.

I'll show their house first since it's the best.

I like that last one. It looks like you're on their golf course. See that space between the top of the house and the top where the pool is? That's the gnome croquet course. A quote from my sister on that: "Gnomes are the only things that can actually fit under there, except maybe leprechauns, but gnomes are better."

If you can't read the sign in front of it, it says "Gianni and Anny's FL Beach Resort (All Creatures Accepted)." I loved their concept of a Florida resort decorated for winter.

One of their walls kept falling down, so they finally just made it removable and decorated the inside.


Their pool and weight-lifting bench was my favorite part.

Okay, moving on to Lucas' and my orthodox winter cottage. We have a frozen pool in the back, a frozen river along the side, grass poking through the snow, an igloo out back, and a snowman in front.

My favorite part of ours is the frozen flag. Lucas decided to dip the flag in icing to make it look frosted.

I've actually missed Lucas and Gianni this summer. We live five minutes away from them, and most summers, we see them at least twice a week. But we've all been busy this summer, so it was a lot of fun to have a whole day just to hang out.

I had so much fun doing this! It gave us an excuse to use the stale marshmallows and old Halloween candy that everyone felt too guilty to throw away. =]