the house that the kit built

Ok, I've got nothing against people who make homemade gingerbread houses.  I even did it myself, as I'm sure you all remember.   But I also had a back-up plan:  a boxed Gingerbread House kit.  My mother in law was kind enough to mail me a big huge one, and when I got the box, I was amazed at how organized and compartmented it was.  Here's your icing, here's your sprinkles, here's your house walls, etc.  You get the idea.  That's my kind of gingerbread house.  

The house sustained a bit of damage in transit, but I just repaired it a bit a few hours before we started decorating.  I've even included pictures of me in this post, because I've pretty much quit caring about what I look like.  Lucky you.  

Since there was some past experience to go off of, the girls were pumped up for house #2.  We again got to sit on the table, which is a big hit with em and mantha.  You can see that even though repairs were made, we think that Santa misjudged his landing while delivering presents to this particular house.  This part of the roof was unrepairable and kept falling in.  

We started out with icing that worked much better than what I used last time...
...and mantha, notorious for sneaking tastes of everything, all the time decided this icing tasted better than last time too.  
We made a cross hatch pattern on the roof, and Emma and mantha were able to put on their own decorations with a variety of candies provided by said kit.  



Here's a picture of us with the finished product.
We were proud of our work, and I thought it looked better than last time.  


(he better love me! =)