Right away he was drawn to the colorful packages of candy and examined them before doing anything else.
(Disclaimer: The huge yellow knot you see on his forehead is from about five days or so ago when I was trying to put his diaper on him and he jumped away from me and dove off his bed over the side rails face first into the hardwood floor. Save your bubble wrap, folks! We have a toddler who may need it!)
Next, we laid out the pieces and used it as a learning opp. to practice counting. Once everything was lined up and accounted for, the tip of the icing bag was cut and the construction began.
Two of each piece
Watching Mommy prep the tray
Ready to get his hands in there
He was good at being gentle - all that practice building
towers with his wooden blocks must be paying off.
Waiting in anticipation while Mommy holds
it in place for the icing to set-up
Here comes the roof
Time for the candy!
I
didn't realize that once the house was assembled you have to wait
fifteen minutes for the icing to harden before decorating. I guess this
is a lesson in reading all the directions before you begin! Anyway,
Caleb was chomping at the bit to start adding some color to this
structure, and I wasn't sure how I was going to calm him until
the house was ready, especially since the roof kept sliding and I had to
physically hold it together. I decided to try sticking it in the fridge
to speed up the process. Then, I saw the gingerbread man and Christmas
tree that came with the kit and decided to let him decorate those while
we waited. Big hit!
Sorting the candy in anticipation
Exhibiting his patience and precision
The little balls kept rolling off the table which upset him at first.
He kept wanting to get off the ladder to retrieve them until I
told him it was okay and we could just wait until the end. Quite a
bit of the gingerbread house ended up being decorated with candy
that hit the floor. Oh well, at least we didn't take it to a holiday party, right? :)
Good job, little man! (Oops! I forgot you corrected me the other day
that you are not a little man; you are a big man.)
The
fridge helped some I think but the house still didn't look great when I
took it out. The walls were falling over and the roof was sliding.
At that point, I deemed it good enough for all our intents and purposes
though and let him start. Lots of icing-squirting and finger-licking
ensued as he began to adorn this incredible creation.
The gingerbread man may be afraid to live in this.
Wonder if the building inspector will condemn it?
Testing the icing
Oh, a little icing on my fingers...no problem!
Artist at work
Time to start on the other side
May as well take another taste while considering what to do next
Are you sneaking another lick?
So many choices
Beautiful work!
Hadley
watched the construction but was taking her bath during the decorating
process. She was happy with what she saw when she got back. She was even
happier to see Aunt Courtney had stopped by after work!
A few finishing touches and then sitting back to admire his work before the roof fell off...
He attempted to reassemble and then we decided together that the best course of action at this point was just to go ahead and snack on it.
What's the first thing he did the next morning when we got downstairs? Climbed on a chair to take a bite, of course! A few weeks or so ago he asked me for some gingerbread. I don't know how to make it and haven't really taken the time to look up how to do it, but my friend Kelli gave us a few Pepperidge Farm gingerbread men cookies so that sufficed. Now that he had a whole house to munch, he was ecstatic. For the next for days nibbling throughout the day continued.
While he wasn't looking yesterday, we finally threw out the edible art project to keep him from eating any more, but for three or four days it certainly a great source of excitement. Any tips anyone wants to give us for creating a sturdier structure the next time around are welcome. Thanks for reading!
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