By Tessa McCarthy
There are countless activities to do during the holiday season that are sure to get you into the holly jolly Christmas spirit. Heading to your local farm to pick out the perfect Christmas tree, baking festive cut-out cookies to gift to loved ones, binge-watching your favorite Christmas movies— the list goes on. For me, a true lover of Christmas, I cherish all these traditions. However, nothing compares to my family’s tradition of decorating gingerbread houses.
We have decorated gingerbread houses for as long as I can remember. We go through countless brainstorming sessions, thinking of new, creative ways to take our decorations to the next level. This has resulted in each family member having their very own specialties and duties when it comes to the construction process.
My mom oversees assembling the house and makes Christmas trees with upside-down ice cream cones covered in green frosting. The important responsibility of making snowmen out of fluffy marshmallows stacked atop one another goes to my dad. He even finishes them off with licorice hats and pipes, and a gummy carrot nose. My sister lays cinnamon gum on the roofs to give a life-like brick-laid effect. She even recently started adding tiny strings of icing to look like icicles hanging from the roof.
I tackle landscaping— a layer of powdered sugar as the snowy base. I even add a frozen pond in the backyard (melted blue hard candy) and top it with candy fish. It’s lined with rock candy and elevated with pretzel benches for the perfect finishing touch. Then, we all combine forces (my sister and I mastermind it, though), and finish up the exterior of the house. After hours of work and very sticky hands, we are left with an extravagant gingerbread house that we proudly keep on display during the holiday season.
When we host holiday parties, our guests look at it and ask us how we accomplished these minute details (one year, I think we even had a doorbell) that made the gingerbread house a level above the rest. Always filled with pride, my family and I gush about our creation and encourage others to get in on the tradition, too!
If you are feeling inspired and would like to get crafty this Christmas, check out our Graham Cracker House! It’s the perfect way to dip your toes into the best holiday tradition of all time.
You can stock up on these gingerbread house necessities and make it your own!
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Tessa is the assistant content editor for SavoryOnline, where she combines her skills in storytelling with her passion for food. She loves learning about nutrition, trying new recipes, and capturing her kitchen creations—whether through photos or the playlists that soundtrack her cooking.
