Some Holiday Sugar for you

I have a confession to make.

For a weaselly agnostic, I am inordinately fond of Christmas.

I know every verse of "Jingle Bells," including the one about the bobtail nag and two-forty for his speed. I own a set of ornaments that are a little marching band that ding out 12 carols on their bells when you plug them in. I have several versions - album, cassette, and CD - of the Chipmunks Christmas album (which OG is very into right now. Joy!)

I like Christmas songs, Christmas lights, Christmas trees, Christmas cookies, Christmas beer parties, wrapping presents, and pretty much everything about the holiday except all that religion. (Though, strangely, Bing Crosby singing "O Holy Night" will bring me to tears. As will the ending of "A Charlie Brown Christmas," I found out a couple of nights ago. It went: "Lu lu lu, lu lu lu luuu, [sob, sniff]".)

So, the (tiny, but appropriate for the tiny house) tree went up over Thanksgiving, and my half-assed white-trashy attempts at throwing up some lights around the front door went up last weekend.

We went to the beer-tasting party last weekend, are going to see Santa and the Trail of Lights this weekend, and next weekend will have a cookie swap party and the obligatory Xmas with the family of The Man. Presents for the children will be somewhat diminished, due to the enormous money-wasting enterprises of last month (what with the lost keys and the washed cell phone and the entirely-too-difficult basketball league that just did not work out for OG, there was a good $500 down the drain,) but they will still be well-compensated.

But this week, it was time for the special ritual that the OG and I have adopted...the gingerbread house.

I had never done one before, but one year, I signed up for one of those sessions at the Children's Museum. Since then, for OG, it has just become something that must be done.

And, I have to admit, it's good for me, too. An activity I can do with my spirited child that encourages getting messy, playing with our food, and licking sticky icing off our fingers is just what we need sometimes. There's no fights, no arguments, no power struggles; just us, candy, and a blank canvas.

This year, I bought a kit at Central Market and some extra candy, and we just did it ourselves for the first time. We put several days and a lot of thought into it, and this is the final product (with icing on the face to emphasize the point that this is a DIY project, people!)


I think it is really good, don't you? Seriously! I totally love this thing! I put it on its own little table, with a tablecloth, so we can all admire it for a while. (But, I must ask: Do people eat these things? Not having come from folk who do them, I just don't know the answer. OG is all ready to do so, no matter how stale it is.)

And, just for equal time, I'll post a picture of YG, who was generally unhelpful at the whole gingerbread house making thing, as she just stuffed the candy in her mouth. For some reason, Blogger won't let me post the picture I really want to post - wherein she looks just like Cindy Lou Who under the Christmas tree - but will let this one through, so here ya go:


(See, you're supposed to put those on the cats, but they won't tolerate it. So, we put it on the two-year-old, who can't fight back. Haw!)