Ski Condo Gingerbread

For the past few years, our Christmas vacation has included a 6 person ski vacation which requires nothing short of a 12 month planning effort to pull off. The logistics involved in getting 6 people, 10 skis, 1 snowboard, 12 boots, 12 gloves, 6 pairs of snowpants, an entire case of handwarmers and enough carbohydrate laden groceries to fuel an entire naval battalion packed and transported from Connecticut to Vermont takes about all of the energy I have. One thing that the ski trip precluded, however, was our traditional gingerbread extravaganza. So last year, along with the winter clothes packing melee, I packed up all the gingerbread paraphanalia and took it along, too.

One thing we changed, however, is the substitution of graham crackers for real gingerbread. And this small change made a world of difference in my ability to pull this off! I highly recommed it.

Here's the set up:

Note the number of candies stored in tupperware. Doing this ahead of time made the packing and clean up much quicker. Also, key to clean up was the disposable plastic tablecloth that we just wrapped up and threw away at the end of the night. It conveniently kept the rainbos sprinkles out of the carpeting.

With the artistic freedom of graham crackers (which can be broken and cut on demand, rather than gingerbread which needs to be templated and baked ahead of time), creativity ran rampant. Yes, Bruce constructed a volcano...complete with red hot spewing lava (that was made of, well, red hots...you know,the cinnamon candies?). This may be the only graham cracker volcano ever constructed:

I also packed up our icing spatulas, not wanting to rely on whatever odd and assorted cutlery we may have found in the condo kitchen. Here you see Mary, hard at work on her one storey saltbox.

And finally, here is my storybook cottage, complete with christmas lights in the hedges, a pretzel picket fence, and coconut snow in the front yard.

Gingerbread Villages

This is the time of year when typically, our Christmas shopping is done (yes, really. Don't hate me - I like to get it out of the way so we can enjoy the season) and we turn our attention to holiday fun. One of our favorite holiday traditions is to make gingerbread houses with our godkids. We started this a number of years ago, and discovered that this is an activity that everyone can participate in, regardless of age. We also have amazing conversations as the six of us sit around the table for several hours.

We do quite a bit of preparation for this extravaganza, usually starting a week ahead of time, but you can start even earlier if you freeze the dough. Bruce and I make the dough and use templates to create the pieces of the houses. I created templates using 3" x 5" file cards which turns out to be an ideal size. We can get 6 individual houses from a double batch of gingerbread dough, and the finished house size fits on a bread board with enough room to still have a yard to decorate.

Here's Bruce cutting dough to templates:

Once baked, we store the pieces in zip lock bags for up to a week.

On decorating day, we set up work stations at the expanded table. Everybody works on a cookie sheet with a lip (to keep stray decorations from landing on the 1970's shag carpeting in our dining room. Oy vey.) We have a long shopping list of "construction candies" and I open everything and put it out in bowls for easy access. I make a huge batch of royal icing, and fill 6 icing bags which we stand up in heavy coffee mugs for easy access. Everyone also has a flat spreading spatula. Here's the "before" shot of the work table:

Here's an action shot of the "during"! Evan and Mary are consulting on Evan's liberal use of sprinkles. Caitlin is deep in thought (this is the day she got icing on her back...we still don't know how) and Bruce is in the throws of creating a groovy jalopy out of pretzles and life savers. Sarah is just off camera to the right. My work station is in the bottom middle of the photo.

Graham crackers as interior walls help support heavily decorated exterior walls. We've also used big marshmallows inside to help prop things up. This is Sarah's pretzel log cabin, with assembly in progress. Note her cool fruit roll-up roofing with candy cane beams...

The finished village...

Happy Frosting to all, and to all a good night.

Welcome to my alleged renaissance

Last year was a wash for me. The stress of my day job meant that I had little time and no emotional fortitude to do anything creative. I suffered because of it. I managed a few interesting creative projects - most notably some clever birthday cakes, both of which involved significant marzipan and lots of food coloring:

April Garden Cake for Bruce's Grandmother's 93rd Birthday

Safari Cake for the Great May Birthday Celebration

(whereupon war broke out over who got the blue hippo...go figure...)

This year, however, I'm planning on getting back into my studio and doing something less fattening in the creative department.

Here's a sneak preview - for the last 4 years, my eldest godchild and I have taken a lampworking class together to celebrate her birthday. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the collection of handmade beads I've created, but here are a few photos of some of the more choice pieces:

Join me, as I attempt to keep myself motivated, not just with some quilting projects, but with some other creative endeavors as well. Stay tuned, and I'll attempt to share what I'm working on, and what I'm finding inspiring.

And please, if you see something that inspires you - will you share?