Gingerbread lighthouse and cottage 2011/2012

The last time I posted a gingerbread house, it was Jan 2010.  Needless to say, with my mother’s illness in Dec of 2010, things went a little crazy.  We still got one done but I didn’t have time to post.

*Here are a few pictures from Dec 2010/Jan 2011. 

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*So, this year I was still dragging.  I love that my mother is now in a care facility nearby and am grateful to have the extra time with her, but it does add extra time. Anyway, my niece saw this cute little tin with a lighthouse and wondered whether I could do one for our annual tradition.  (See other posts, more on gingerbread houses and gingerbread houses).

*The first problem to tackle was the idea that the lighthouse needs to be near the water.  Unlike previous houses, we needed to have a setup where the water made sense and played a part.  I decided to use the rice crispie treat idea to design a landscape – chocolate rice crispies for the land and regular for the sandy beach.  I crushed regular cheerios and chocolate cheerios and blended them to make the rest of the sand that would cover the beach.  Later I mixed a darker mix of the crushed cheerios to make the path.

*Another complicating factor was the light placement.  Every year we would build a house around a hole in the board where we could put the light and then pull it out before the breaking.  This year I had to run the wires under the rice crispie treat landscape.  The placement had to be indicated before I started and then before the treats became too hard.  (Before the breaking, the wires were cut to remove the LEDs.)

*I adapted a pattern for the lighthouse from the web – What I needed was a good top.  So, I made an aluminum foil ball, sprayed it with non-stick spray, and placed on the cookie sheet.  Then I draped a piece of gingerbread over the top.

*I also adapted a house from  The Gingerbread Architect.  Oddly, it was a little more difficult to make the smaller house because the cutting actually has to be more refined – smaller windows, doors and decorations.

*As usual I poured caramelized sugar for the windows and attached them to the building pieces before we raised the buildings.  (We also decorate the walls.)

*For the water, I molded the aluminum foil around the bay and poured the sugar syrup into it.  Then I let it cool until it was hardened.

*The roof for cottage was regular sized M&Ms, while the lighthouse had mini M&Ms.  I also piped with icing sugar the railings, let them dry, and then carefully piped them into place (with all sorts of little bottles to hold them while they dried).

*All that was left was to make it snow.

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…and, of course, we had our usual breaking party…  Buddhist non-attachment and a lot of fun for all the kids.

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