The Gingerbread Bandit

There is an old legend of a sneaky little guy called the "Gingerbread Bandit." He's also been known to be called the "Gingerbread Criminal." If you don't eat your gingerbread house quickly enough after Christmas, he sneaks in and eats all the candy!!!! (Maybe because he thinks you're not going to eat it?) Well, I have never seen him before, I thought maybe he was just a myth, but we got hit HARD this year up in Muskegon by the Gingerbread Bandit. He left us notes and everything. I guess we were too busy playing to pay close enough attention to guard the house. Let it be a lesson to you all out there: He's real. Eat your gingerbread houses soon after Christmas or he will.

Gingerbread House 2011

So trying to do anything Christmas related before the move was just not going to happen. I didn't want to skip it, though so I packed all my stuff to do at the Bean house after we got there. So after packing up Friday, driving Saturday, and unpacking Sunday...Monday we relaxed a bit and during naps I baked the gingerbread house parts, and then Monday evening we decorated it! It was fun to do some Christmas-y things. I asked Josh how he wanted to decorate it this year and he answered "like a Christmas tree!" (Of course, why wasn't I thinking that?)

It didn't go quite as planned...instead of the frosting looking like on the left...it quickly flopped and looked like the picture on the right. It was still cute, though.

I don't think Brooke minded as long as she got to eat M&Ms and frosting.

She was very into her work. I handed her a star to frost for the top and of course one of them had a Brooklynn-sized bite out of it...we used it anyway.   

 Josh AND Brooklynn were pretty into their work.

Brooklynn demonstrating her favorite part of this activity:

 And here is our finished product...our gingerbread house decorated like a Christmas Tree.

I didn't weigh it but if I were to guess it's about 12 pounds of cookie, frosting and candy.

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!

We had extra candy from our gingerbread house, so I thought it would be fun to do another one with all the Bean kids while we were there.

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?