Our Halloween Gingerbread House

 I decided to make more use out of my gingerbread mold and do a Halloween-themed one. (Since I don't really like candy corn, anyway, but buy it EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR. because I just can't help myself b/c it's so festive.)

Brooklynn....LOVES these candy pumpkins. And helped me eat so many of them while we were decorating, after right off the house...she's having a ball with eating all the candy off of this thing.
Brooklynn did the chimney and the pumpkins along the roof. Good thing I took pictures right afterwards because all the chocolate chips and most of the pumpkins are already gone.

Gingerbread 2010!

It's gingerbread time! This year was much better than last year. Brooklynn was fully healthy and so much more excited to help. Last year she had fun but I feel like I forced her a little bit to eat some frosting to get a few pictures.

Brooklynn helped to mix the dough. What a good helper.

I let Brooklynn lick the beater. She was so excited.

Brooklynn was very excited when she thought she could get "free refills" on her beater with all this extra dough.

Brooklynn helping roll the dough into the mold.

I highly recommend using some sort of string to hold your house together like this while you wait for the frosting to dry. After several cave-ins...we will not be using the recipe for this particular frosting again.

Brooklynn posing by our completed, un-decorated house.

Brooklynn can hardly contain herself waiting until after I take this picture. Josh is getting pretty good at faking the strain on his face from having to hold her so still.

All of our decorations!

Brooklynn was very focused on putting the decorations on. Especially the cookies. She kept going from extremely focused to yelling, "COOKIE!!!"

Silly Brooklynn!

Brooklynn does this pose to our tree all the time, too. I think it translates to, "I REALLY love this. Please take my picture by it."

Brooklynn did the chimney all by herself.

Brooklynn and Mommy. (If you click on the picture you can see frosting and crumbs all over Brooke's face.)

Daddy and Brooklynn

I'm pretty sure Josh had the most fun of all. Here you can see him in front of his pond, snow on one side and fire on the other.

Our finished product, each side.

THINGS YOU MIGHT HEAR YOURSELF SAYING IF YOU ATTEMPT TO DECORATE A GINGERBREAD HOUSE WITH A 22-MONTH-OLD:

"Just a little bit lower, Brooklynn"

"The decorations go ON the house, not IN the frosting."

"Don't eat our stone path, yet!"

"Stop eating the dough. You already had a beater."

"Really, Brooklynn? We JUST put that pretzel tree on there and it's already in your hand."

Guess why Brooklynn had SO much fun?

Mommy's Helper

So Brooklynn really wanted to help me make apple pie. She actually dumped all her toys out and tried to use the containers they were in to climb on top of the table. While I was impressed at her ingenuity, I didn't want her climbing on the table (partly for safety, but also because I didn't want her to mess up my pie crust) so I decided to get her a stool so she could help. When just the stool was there she continued to try to climb on the table. SO, I let her help. I got a bowl and a spoon and some dry oatmeal she could stir up. I wasn't using the oatmeal, but she didn't care. I wanted something that would be easy to clean up, even though it was horribly messy. This kept her busy the whole time I rolled out my pie crust and part of the time when I sliced my apples. (Then she also wanted to stir and eat some apples.)

I have a feeling she is going to want to help more and more and I don't mind at all. I love it.

Here are our apple pies. Mmmmmmm.

Gingerbread!

So we were a little late with our Gingerbread house this year because of Brooklynn's sickness. But we did it! I especially loved how Brooke "helped." (Notice the fingerprints on the roof, and the frosting all over the table.)