Making a gingerbread house is not wholesome family fun...

[TellMeDinosaurFacts]

...because of the amount of bastard swearing that ensues.

A dear friend has sent a Baked In Gingerbread House kit as "family festive fun" for us to make before Christmas. I have a very enthusiastic 5yo and we've tried our absolute best but MY GOD rolling out dough between slippery sheets of baking paper and trying to help her cut round paper templates only to have the dough crumble as we attempt to transfer it to the baking tray has driven me to madness already. We managed a rough assemblage of a pre-baked IKEA job last year, but that only worked because we used wooden bricks for structural integrity on the inside.

I would upload a photo but we've barely made a start and already I am wondering how I'm ever going to forgive my friend for sending it.

Please send hints & tips, photos for me to rage at with jealousy, etc etc

YABU = my 3 year old and I knocked up a scale replica of Blenheim Palace before breakfast this morning. I don't know what you're talking about.

YANBU = they are the devil's work, and the perfect ones you're seeing on Facebook only turn out that way because the maker has sold their soul.

@hollyandIvyandAllThingsYule that is utterly gorgeous- the light inside!

They're all so good!
Has anyone got photos of disasters, or do we forget about those as soon as...?

I appreciate all of the 'next time try ...' advice but wish it recorded for posterity that I never intend to do this again and only did it this time as we were sent it as a present...

I've been getting together with a friend and her child, plus my two, to make gingerbread houses every year for about 5 years now. The oldest child is now 14 . We have got it down to a fine art - including making all the dough, rolling and baking ourselves (preens). We never expect the houses to look great (DS1s tends to resemble one of those vandalised, falling down sheds you see on abandoned land near railways: two days later it's more post-police-raid-crack-house) but it's good wholesome fun, and we get time for a natter while they create (eat handfuls of sweets).

[quote TellMeDinosaurFacts]@hollyandIvyandAllThingsYule that is utterly gorgeous- the light inside![/quote]
Ah thank you.🎄 I used a little string of lights (battery operated).

I ended up smashing it to bits a day later not my proudest moment. But in my defence my DH had been hospitalised and could have died only a few weeks before so I was running at peak stress level.