Tradition 2: The Gingerbread House

I made it through finals (WAHOO!!) and got back home late on a Wednesday night.  Thursday rolled around and you know what that means... Gingerbread House time.  Over the years, I have progressed from graham cracker houses to pre-made gingerbread houses.  This year I was embarking on a new endeavor, a gingerbread house made from scratch.  Well, it was almost a new endeavor, I tried it once before but failed.  I went to my trusty Pinterest and found a recipe.

I traced out the shapes for the house on wax paper, cut the dough, cooked it, and it turned out great.  I whipped up some frosting of egg whites, powdered sugar, and cream of tartar and started building.  It amazingly didn't fall apart!

Next up was the fun part, decorating.  I made chocolate snowflakes by melting chocolate chips in a bag and then squirting the chocolate into snowflakes on a sheet of wax paper.  After they dried, they became the perfect decoration for the roof.  The rest of the house was adorned with candy that I found around the house (probably stale, but no one eats it anyways).

 A bit messy....
 

My masterpiece turned out fabulous, and my mom found a nice cake stand for it to sit on and a perfect spot to display it on the shelf (look in the right corner of the picture of us....can you find it?)