Sugarlicious Sugarfest!

On our previous friendly holiday celebration,

 Kelly-Across-the-Street and I

let our young kids smash things with a hammer.

At this event,

we were as equally irresponsible,

we gave them bowls of candy.

Big bowls of candy.

We admit a love/hate relationship with the tradition.

It's amazingly fun.

It's a huge amount of sugar.

It wouldn't be quite as fun building with broccoli and cauliflower,

so we let our drive for healthy snacks take a backseat,

while we all nibble on sugarlicious.

Who can resist oodles and oddles of delicious, colorful candy?

None of us.

We were trying to make Gingerbread Houses,

our annual tradition with a heavy emphasis on

TRYING.

With several years of failure and hot glue gun rescues behind us,

this year we found the BEST kits-

pre-made houses at Costco with more than enough

mixed frosting in a plastic bag and a lot of candy.

Norah was very free in her style.

Avery's fine motor skills have impressively improved.

This year I also think he put at least as much candy on his house,

as he did in his tummy.

Rebekah now likes to try to follow the picture on the box.

Jon embraces his artistic leanings when the medium is sugar.

He also figures out how to use the MOST amount of the candies he loves,

knowing he will get to eat the candy off his house

during the Christmas clean-up and pack-up ritual.

Yea! 

Another fun year! 

Another sugar high!

Another memory to add to our lives.

Follow us back...

2009 Gingerbread

2008 Gingerbread

2007 Gingerbread

The kids aren't thinking about friendships.

They aren't thinking about traditions.

They aren't thinking about memories.

They're thinking about the sugar.

 Someday, they'll look back at these experiences,

as holiday-shaping, friendship-building times.

And, I'm pretty sure,

they'll plan an annual

Sugarlicious

 Gingerbread-House-Making

Sugarfest

with their kids.