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By Heide Kennedy, Arizona Farm Bureau Communications Intern

Making gingerbread houses is a tradition that many families enjoy during the Christmas season, and rightfully so! It is so much fun to gather the whole family, eat some holiday treats, and see who can decorate the silliest or most elaborate gingerbread house! Here are some tips to help ensure that your house building is an enjoyable success!

Options for easy “lumber”

While homemade gingerbread is obviously the best, it can be time and labor-intensive to get the ingredients, make it, bake it, and then shape it. So, if you’re looking to save some time, opt for premade alternatives. While you could always get the gingerbread house kits from the store, you could also try something more unique, like using graham crackers to build the walls of your house, or large pretzel rods to make a log cabin!

Go all out with décor

Offer a wide variety of different candies, sprinkles, pretzels, cereals, and crackers to decorate your houses with! Having a couple of different colored icings is nice too! The dollar store is the perfect place to get a lot of these candies, as they have smaller sized bags, and they typically have a large selection to choose from!

Make it a competition

For those who are competitive, pick a criterion such as most unique, most realistic, or most creative and turn it into a competition! Make friends or family be the judge of who built the best house! Have a fun, small prize for the winner such as a giant candy bar or gift card!

Making gingerbread houses is the perfect opportunity for spending time with family this holiday season. So, gather your supplies and your family and build away!

For more holiday articles, check out the Fill Your Plate blog!