Hooked on gingerbread houses

After having so much fun making wooden birdhouses into gingerbread, I just had to make more.

Of course, I tend to go all in with a new craft and flood the market with my creations.  But this year, I was making them just for us, so reigned myself back just a little.

And after a decade of making real gingerbread houses that looked like a toddler had done the work, I was excited to be working on one with paint instead of icing. Puffy paint, meant for tee shirts is so much easier to use than those plastic bags of icing that come with the house kits.

Since I was using wood and chipboard, I thought it was important to use cookie colored paint, as much as I like pastels, I wanted it to look as realistic as it could.  Plus the village was going into our Cocoa Corner, where our colors were more traditional than my other holiday decor.

Sugarwings has a couple to finish too, and they will be squeezed in when done.  There is always room for more!

We have already had to shuffle the area around a little.  At first, we were using our tea party cups from Sugarwings’ other grandma who passed away.   But with the giant, cocoa bombs we made, we figured we had to get some bigger mugs, so switched the dainty cups for hefty, Santa mugs.

The largest, chipboard house is ideal storage for a ziplock baggie of cocoa bombs. The roof comes off, like a lid and there is plenty of space inside.

When we are ready for our cocoa parties, my grand fairy comes to this buffet to gather up all the supplies and set the table.  We have some very strict guidelines for drinking hot chocolate, first and foremost- 

Cocoa parties can only occur in front of a lit Christmas tree!

A few more rules-

Tea party rules apply: polite chitchat, best manners, etc.

Watching Christmas shows on the TV while drinking cocoa is encouraged.

The table must have a cloth on it and napkins can be paper, but must be pretty.

Santa hats or antlers need to be on your head.