Early in December, we drove up to Frederick and took the Walkersville Southern Railroad Santa Train ... a cute, old fashioned train. Santa was on the train and came and met everybody (which was a thrill for a lot of the really little kids).
This photo of C9 on the train reminds me of Grandma Lu:
Then we hit downtown Frederick for lunch as a great restaurant and some antique store looking for small tables with two shelves ... didn't find one. But we all had fun looking.
And this past weekend we made gingerbread houses. Of course, it is a many-day'd affair. Make the dough (two separate days), make the templates (one day), bake the pieces (one day) and then put them together and decorate (one day).
I don't have to always make new templates, but of course I lose pieces, and the kids have different ideas about what they want to decorate. This year C9 wanted a book. The ideas I came up with (that I thought I could construct) and the ideas she came up with (and thought I could construct) were in two different universes. So we moved onto a forest. This is hers, with her friend G10, who came over to help decorate.
I loved it, it looked really cool, especially before the candy was on it!
Q7 first wanted the castle we had made for her two years ago, but then decided a tower would be OK. So I started to make a tower and the first piece I made looked like a lighthouse. So lighthouse it was. And we pulled out Trouble at the Nubble of course, as our reminder of our trip to York Beach, Maine. So crooked lighthouse it was. Is. The thing isn't eaten yet. Both are going into classroooms.
Mine was just a house. But I did some new trees. LOVE them!!! I tried to make it more gingerbready than candy-ish for the adults at Christmas Eve. Still plenty of candy. And, yes, the shingles are on upside down! I went top down instead of bottom up!!
