long day, hard work

it has been an incredibly long day, but i finally finished my gingerbread house after work. i guess today was fitting seeing as it snowed quite a bit. i can say this is one of the hardest things i've ever done. holy cow! i'm not sure if it was so tough because i thought it should be pretty easy or what. although my mom did tell me that a coworker of hers said it was really tough, so i feel a bit relieved about it.

it definitely looks homemade, but i like that because it is! haha and really... i couldn't get it any other way. i did go a bit above the basic and made actual windows on each side of the house out of candy. so i'm pretty stoked on those. they aren't as beautiful as the ones in the book, but they'll do for my first one. i opted for a more basic house because as i was attempting to roll the dough out i realized that something fancy probably wasn't going to happen, especially in any normal amount of time. i can honestly say this will most-likely NOT be a phipps christmas tradition, but you never know. i could get brave again some year and pump another one out. i'm glad i tried it out; i no longer wonder about it.

as for the recipe... i'm still not sure what i think about it. i want to say it was good, but it was so hard that i want to say it was terrible. user error i suppose. there was a lot of tips though, i will say that. the book called for a cathedral not really a house, which i think would be nearly impossible! she also included a royal icing recipe which worked okay. i had to adjust it a bit because it wouldn't stiffen, but we are pretty highly elevated, so that could've been the problem. she has so many recipes for christmas cookies, ones i've never heard of before, so ultimately, if you can find a copy, you should pick it up.