Merry Christmas

We've caroled, and baked, and shopped, and wrapped, decorated, and gone to church, performed in plays, handed out cards, delivered cookies to the neighbors, and eaten way too many sweets ourselves. We've played in the snow, warmed up with hot chocolate, and opened almost all the advent calendar doors. But still, the children were worried.

It is nearly Christmas Eve, and the gingerbread house had not yet appeared...

...until this morning.

I stayed up late last night, baking, and decorating away.

Actually, I didn't stay up too late. A small house like we enjoy, for a Christmas Eve treat, takes about three hours from start to finish. If you haven't tried one of these from scratch yet, let me encourage you to take the plunge. They are so much fun.

I used our usual template (from here), and a single batch of gingerbread dough, following Betty Crocker's gingerbread people recipe, with a butter cream frosting.

I saved the template from last year, paper clipped in the back of my cookbook, so I didn't have to print it out again. Which sped things up a bit.

In fact, it all came together so fast, I almost forgot to place the little gingerbread man inside, for D to find, this morning.

It was the first thing he checked for.

From our house to yours - Merry Christmas! We'll see you on the other side (Lord willing).

It's great to be a homeschooler.