The Gingerbread House

Family Daze
The Gingerbread House
By Debbie Farmer

I have to confess that every year in December a strange feeling comes over me. Oh, it's not like I start adopting stray cats or wearing men's shoes or anything like that. It's more like a sudden desire to do all of the domestic things that I wouldn't think of doing the rest of the year—like making bread from scratch or crafting nifty items out of coat hangers and pairs of old pantyhose.

Now, this may not be a shocking transformation for some people, but anyone who knows me knows that I’m the type of person who glues loose buttons on sweaters and who will toss a frozen pot pie in the microwave, press start, and feel that that can be called “baking.”

But not in December. Frankly I have no idea why this happens. Maybe I'm subconsciously trying to make up for lost time. Or perhaps it's my way of building lasting family memories for my children. Or maybe it's all of the rum in the eggnog. Whatever the reason, it has happened again this year.

I know because the other day my children and I tried to make a gingerbread house. Well, mostly, it was me trying to get the kids to help me make a gingerbread house, but you get the idea.

Now, if you are sitting there thinking that a person who can barely make a sandwich has absolutely no business constructing an entire gingerbread house without supervision, you are right. But, let's face it, only certain types of parents are strong enough to resist a Gingerbread House Kit with the words “fun” and “easy” in big, red letters on the top—and I'm not one of them. Besides, it came with everything we'd need: frosting mix, gum drops and prefab gingerbread walls. All in all, it would take fifteen minutes to piece together. Twenty, tops.

My children listened (mostly to the TV in the living room) as I read the directions out loud.

“To make frosting, add one cup of cold water to confectioners’ sugar and stir until thickened.”

Then I measured the water into the special cup included with the kit and poured it into the bowl.

But, as my son stirred it, I began to suspect there was some kind of problem.

“Mom,” he said. “Can I stop now?”

I looked into the bowl and the frosting was still thin. So I reread the directions, and it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, “one cup” meant the first line on the special plastic cup and not the second. Naturally, since I couldn't take the extra water out, the easiest thing to do would be to put more confectioners' sugar in. But my kitchen being what it is, the closest thing I could find was a handful of flour and eleven packets of Sweet and Low.

I sprinkled them in when no one was looking then I continued reading the directions: Let frosting stand for 60 minutes. Sixty? I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be the one who has to tell one bored preteen and one even more bored teen that this is going to take an hour longer than I thought. Besides, if I let them escape now, with the promise to return in sixty minutes’ time, I knew my son would return—I mean, hey, frosting is involved—but I wasn’t so sure about my 14-year-old daughter.

Now, at this point you would think I'd have accepted reality, given the kids the go-ahead to go and wandered away to watch Christmas specials on television. But noooooo. Instead, I slathered frosting on the edges of the walls, stuck them together, and dried the house with my blow dryer.

Then my son and daughter used the frosting to stick gumdrops and eight tiny, plastic reindeer on the roof. Granted, my daughter helped with some protesting, but she relented, and I managed to take several pictures between grimaces, so it looks like my daughter wasn’t wishing she was at a mall with her friends. Years from now, in my senility, all I’ll know when I look at the pictures is that we once bonded over gingerbread. And when she let her guard down, truth be told, my daughter did look like she was enjoying herself.

But if my past experience with Christmas crafts has taught me anything it's that moments like this just don't last. So, frankly, I wasn't too surprised when all of the reindeer slid off the roof and were buried beneath a pile of loose gumdrops.

“Cool, an avalanche,” my son said.

Call me weird, but as I stood there blow-drying the remaining gumdrops to the eaves, I secretly couldn’t wait until January, when I could go back to my simple, undomesticated ways.

Sometimes it's better that way.

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Debbie Farmer is a humorist and a mother of two kids, holding down the fort in California. She is also the author of Don’t Put Lipstick on the Cat and can be reached at www.familydaze.com, or by writing familydaze@oasisnewsfeatures.com.