Day 15 - Gingerbread Houses...Relinquishing Control

For me, whenever I hand the kids a pastry bag full of frosting, I undergo a great battle of the wills. My wills, not theirs. Part of me wants so badly to grab their hands and guide the frosting where it should go. Part of me wants to yell out, "No! That shouldn't go there!" when a decoration or blob of icing is placed in an odd place. But that other part of me knows that they will have so much more fun doing it on their own. And that same part of me reminds myself that, Hey, Control Freak, this is just a gingerbread house!

Today we met with some of our co-op friends to decorate gingerbread houses. Now, I have to admit that I am the one who assembled our house. Amidst the chorus of "Oh, can I do it? Pleeeease?" I firmly gripped the icing and continued my assembly. But I did turn them completely loose on the house when it came down to decorating.

They seemed to have fun...globs and globs of icing helped adhere fruit roll-ups as roofing materials.

And the Princess thought a whole roll of string licorice added a certain je ne sais croix to the roof; however, a mini-Control Freak must have removed it at some point because it did not make the finished house.

Did I mention I was a good mom and let them do this project on their own? Of course, that was easier since there were other moms to talk to. I'd never pass up an opportunity to converse with grown-ups.

I did make one contribution to the house. When we first got there, I piped some icicles. I left them out on the table to dry, though, which was not the smartest move because some got broken and some got smooshed, but I did have enough for the front at least.

My icicles were certainly not as creative as the strand of colorful Christmas lights Michael prepared for the back. He's always the one to think outside the box, and I was thankful I set my control freak aside today so that he was able to come up with such a cute idea.