2013 National Gingerbread House Competition

The Omni Grove Park Inn

Asheville, NC

This was the twenty first year of the gingerbread house competition. It was started in 1992 with a small group of gingerbread houses built by community members. It was another way to celebrate the holiday season and no one expected it to happen again. Now it has become one of the nation's most celebrated events. The competition is fierce and the caliber of judges is astounding. 

Although it is billed as a gingerbread house competition, the winner this year were animals. A pair of pandas eating bamboo was the grand prize winner. This creation traveled from Wisconsin for the competition. It was very hard to get a good photo as it was in a glass showcase with mirrors on the back.

All items on the entry must be edible except for the base it is built on. Many were made of gingerbread and covered in fondant while others were very much bare gingerbread except for the decorations. So enjoy the show and maybe put it on your calendar for next year. It starts the week before Thanksgiving and runs through New Year's Day. There is a short period of time - I think the week of Christmas - that the top winners are taken to NYC for TV appearances.

Santa is flying in on his Canadian Goose.

Can you see the mice in the clock? The clock weights looked like pine cones.  

This was a very simple A-frame gingerbread house and then they added all the sugar work.  The snowflakes on the roof were a work of art.

And what is not to love about a trip to the amusement park on the boardwalk? 

I think this was one of my favorites. The title was "I Should Have Taken the Sleigh". Can't you just see Santa and the misses zipping around in that sporty red car?

This one was called "Mall Santa". What a familiar scene these days. 

 The details on this piece were incredible. You could stand for an hour and not see everything. Each book on the shelves was individually done. The cards on the mantle painted. There was a worn spot on the braided rug. Look at the stones in the fireplace. Talk about patience!

And one of my favorite. The simplicity of the scene is wonderful. It is called "Gingerbread in G Minor".

A German Christmas Tradition

by AnikasArt

I grew up in northern Germany. It wasn't usually very cold there, but sometimes we had a white Christmas.
The Christmas Tradition in out family was to get up late on Christmas Eve (everybody usually was already off for the Holidays) and have breakfast together. Most of the times we had something special we didn't have every day, like fresh baked hard rolls and some cold cuts. A lot of times it was accompanied by a soft boiled egg, eaten out of an egg holder.
Then it was time to decide which color the decoration of our Christmas tree is going to have, while my dad gave our neighbor a call.
We lived right next to the forest (no, not the black forest, that is in south Germany) at a hill side.
Our neighbor had a small tree farm. Every year we would go there and pick our tree. On Christmas Eve. I know a lot of families, who got their tree much earlier than we did ours, but this was our family tradition.
So once we found all the boxes of Christmas decor, we would get in our Winter Coats and go to the Neighbor. Usually we would wander around for a little while. Our Neighbor also had birds. Not of the small kind. He had big outdoor cages with Owls and Ravens in which the birds could fly, since they were that large. Us kids spend a lot of time watching them, while our parents chatted. We then picked our tree, often a soft needle kind of tree and cut it down. My dad would then go up front and me and my sister in the back, my mom at our side and there we carried the tree through the backyard to our patio.
My dad would then set up the home-made tree stand with water reservoir and set the tree in there.
Us kids would then start to decorate with the help of our mom. Dad would help with the branches at the top of the tree. We always had real candles at our tree. Beeswax ones, that smelled great when they burned. We had to keep them off the bottom branches because of our dog. Then we set up the rest of the decoration, which included a nativity set on a carrousel, one of those that has candles on it and moves.
Then we would go into our rooms and wrap presents if we didn't do it earlier already.
In the evening we would dress up and wait for my mom to call us down with a Christmas bell. She then would proclaim that the Christ Child came and brought presents.
Then it was finally time to exchange presents.
We played for a while with new toys then sat down for dinner, which always consisted of fondue. After dinner we played board games and stayed up late.
That was our German Christmas Tradition.

A bright time at the zoo

by RobinsFlight

Our family visited Cincinnati over the Thanksgiving weekend.  It was a fun time.  On Saturday, we took advantage of the relatively warm weather- the highs were near 50*F- to go to the Cincinnati Zoo.


Each year, like many zoos around the country, the Cincinnati Zoo sets up light displays throughout the grounds.  This year, the displays included nearly 2 million lights, including 20,000 on just the large tree at the entrance!

 


We arrived at the zoo mid-afternoon, with time to see some of the animals before it got dark.  While some of the exhibits were empty, with the animals tucked away in their winter homes, there were still plenty of creatures to see.

My mother even surprised me by facing her fears and accompanying us into the reptile house!  (And those are the alligators we saw there, not my mother!)

I must admit, I was not as brave as she, and did not go with them into the insect exhibit.  Instead, I sat outside and watched as dust settled and the lights came on.

Soon, it was completely dark, and the lights became the main attraction, lining the paths and covering the trees.

 




The highlight was the "Wild Lights" show, located around a pond at the center of the zoo and featuring lights that changed to music.

Lots of other people thought it would be a fun thing to do also.  By the time we left, cars were lined up at the entrance in both directions, waiting to get in!  It's definitely a good thing we got there early.

All in all, it was quite a fun time! 

Cran-cherry chocolate chip bars

I found this recipe, via pinterest, on the Mennonite Girls Can Cook website, and apparently they found it in an old Kraft cookbook.  But, as usual, I can't leave a good recipe alone, so I've modified it somewhat.
These cookie bars are amazing.  The first time I made them, they were gone before the chocolate chip cookies that were also in the house had been finished, which is saying quite a lot in a house where a batch of chocolate chip cookies has an average lifespan of maybe 2 days unless they're rationed.  They mix up very quickly and they're versatile, at home on a holiday cookie plate or in a lunchbox.  And definitely open to substitutions- at the bottom I've included a few ideas, but feel free to experiment yourself too!

Cranberry Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

1/2 c. craisins (dried cranberries)
1/2 c. dried cherries
1/4 c. orange juice
3/4 c. oil
1 1/2 c. light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 c. quick oats
1 1/2 c. white or whole wheat flour
1/4 t. salt
1 t. baking powder
1/2 c. chocolate chips
1/2 c. chopped nuts
melted chocolate (optional)

Preheat over to 350* F.  Grease 9"x13'x2' pan, or line with parchment paper.
In a small bowl or 2 c. measuring cup, combine dried fruit and orange juice.  Microwave for 30 seconds on high, set aside.
In a large bowl, combine oil and sugar.  Mix well.  Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each.
Add oats, flour, salt and baking powder, mix until well combined.
Fold in fruit and juice, chocolate chips and nuts.
Spread into prepared pan.  Bake 20-25 minutes, until set and slightly browned.  Allow to cool completely before cutting.
If desired, before cutting, drizzle with melted chocolate.

Variations:

These would be good with the addition of shredded coconut along with or instead of the nuts.

Use white chocolate chips instead of milk or semi-sweet chocolate.

You could easily substitute other dried fruit for the craisins and cherries.  Try raisins, dates or dried apricots.

For a fun holiday touch, line the baking pan with parchment paper.  After bars are cool, remove from pan in one sheet, and use cookie cutters to cut out bars in holiday shapes.  Drizzle with melted white chocolate.


From the RobinsFlight kitchen to yours, enjoy!

Team Project No. 7, Holidazzle, Part 1

This months' challenge was a hot one. Fourteen people contributed, many of them with more than one entry (sorry, but we can only feature one entry from each person). Our challenge for the month of October was to either:
1. Incorporate 2 of the following colors/gems into an item.
Red (Ruby/Garnet)
Blue (Sapphire)
Citrine
Diamond
Green(Emerald)
Gold/Silver
or
2. Create a paper product incorporating Winter Solstice, Christmas, Hannukah, or Kwanzaa

Let's get started!

Check out this card from KPTography. She managed to incorporate both pieces of the challenge in one entry.









This is new category for us- soap! The Pomegranate and Peppermint soap from Belleskincare sure sounds and looks good.








How about this beautiful stained glass panel from DesignsStainedGlass? Perfect for the holidays and year round.







Want to glitz up your Etsy shop for the holidays? This banner from thebannerloft should do the trick.










See you next week with some more great October entries!