Every Christmas season, we make a gingerbread house. I usually buy one from Costco, which comes with everything in one box. The problem is the gingerbread is not all that yummy, so it pretty much goes uneaten. Dave wanted to make graham cracker houses instead, just like his mom does. Immediately, Rachel loved the idea because she could do it all the way that she wanted. This, apparently, got Alex's brain moving to figure out how he would do his. He came up with the idea of a football field. So, we were in search of candy that could somehow represent the parts of a football field. Then, Zack needed to do something sports related and settled on a soccer field, just to be slightly different from his older brother. Matthew was just happy to throw some candy on his house and probably in his mouth when I wasn't paying too much attention.
Unfortunately, the first two batches of frosting that I made were not quite right, so I was stuck creating another batch and then helping Rachel fix her 3 story hotel that kept falling down. That's right - Rachel set out to build a 3-story hotel with a hot tub - out of graham crackers! I think a little patience would have done her well, but if you know her at all, you know that she's lacking a little in that. After the boys were long done, and I had delayed dinner by an hour or so, I made the frosting using a different recipe and got the consistency we needed to build Rachel's hotel. We even died some frosting blue to fix the hot tub with water.
Dave, of course, produced his own little house that looked perfect. I think the kids respected the beauty of his simple house, but I don't think any of them regretted their choice of construction - despite the fact that none of them turned out as well as they had envisioned. At least, no one can claim that my children are not creative.
Of course, a couple bites here and there were about all that was eaten. The rest was thrown away, exactly the way the simple gingerbread house in a box has been done every other year. We'll see what the kids ask for next year!
He did make this cute robot, though. I just discovered this on the table at some point. I was surprised to find out that Matthew had made him.
Zack's soccer field - I can barely even tell what all the parts are because he couldn't edit himself. He has a bench with players on it and a scoreboard as well.
Alex's football field. He came home and printed out a picture of the Atlanta Falcons' field. But, then, he thought it looked too complicated to make the falcon. So, he decided on the Colts. But, he was truly underestimating how difficult it would be to make an accurate field with candy. He only made 1/2 the field because he ran out of space, and I don't think he ever got to decorating the endzone. And, he definitely never made the goalposts that he had planned.
The failed attempt at the hotel. It kept collapsing slowly until it just became one huge pile of rubble. You can see the remains of the hot tub in this one, though.
The hotel #2 - much better.
Dave's simple, yet stylish house.
