The first Christmas memory that I have is of my mother baking gingerbread. The smell permeating the house. Spicy, warm, overwhelming. The wonderful smell of gingerbread. My mother would bake dozens of houses each year so that each of us 7 girls could have 2 or 3 friends over to decorate houses. We lived out in the middle of nowhere. 150+ acre wheat farm between Walla Walla and Waitsburg. To get to our house you had to negotiate a two mile long gravel road with sharp turns and steep hills. If we got more than about a foot of snow, we were stuck at
home. We sacrificed those school days for snow days more than willingly. Swapping our books for sleds and heading outdoors. We'd stay out until our hands were ice. Tromping inside, kicking off our boots, to be welcomed by Mom with a steaming mug of home-made cocoa (seriously the
best cocoa on the face of the earth). As the days melted into one another with the onset of winter. The nights getting colder and longer, it was time for us to invite those special friends. The ones that would come to our gingerbread party. As soon as school let out for Christmas break there was a notable rise in the excitement around our house. Mother would get out the Kitchen-aid and the stained copy of the gingerbread recipe. Batch after batch would be mixed, refrigerated, rolled, cut, and baked. The smell was overpowering. After the first couple batches were baked you could begin to smell the gingerbread as far away as the barn. Oh it was wonderful! That smell could get us to come inside when nothing else could. Mom always made extra too, so that we could snitch cookies instead of parts of houses. The day after they were baked came the construction. This was the slightly tricky part. The "glue" that held the
houses together was made from egg whites and powdered sugar, and it set
fast. With four hands working though, the houses went up pretty fast. A dozen houses probably took around an hour to construct, so long as they all stayed together. The baking and construction had to take place at least a day before the decorating, so that the gingerbread had a chance to dry a little bit. Moist gingerbread tastes wonderful, but doesn't hold up well. So once the houses were a day old, then it was Party Time! Our friends would arrive and we would go crazy. Candy in bowls being sampled as well as added to houses. Multiple colors of
frosting, also sampled, became the glue with which the candy was held onto the houses. The talking and laughing, decorating and stickiness, lasted for a while. Then when everyone had pronounced their house done, Mom would take a picture. We'd then bundle up and giggle our way outside. Taking our sugar high to the sledding hill behind the barn. We'd sled until parents started coming to pick up friends and houses. The day only truly ended though, after we'd had our first bites of our house. MmmmHmmm. That gingerbread was good.
The first Christmas memory that I have is of my mother baking gingerbread. The smell permeating the house. Spicy, warm, overwhelming. The wonderful smell of gingerbread. My mother would bake dozens of houses each year so that each of us 7 girls could have 2 or 3 friends over to decorate houses. We lived out in the middle of nowhere. 150+ acre wheat farm between Walla Walla and Waitsburg. To get to our house you had to negotiate a two mile long gravel road with sharp turns and steep hills. If we got more than about a foot of snow, we were stuck at
home. We sacrificed those school days for snow days more than willingly. Swapping our books for sleds and heading outdoors. We'd stay out until our hands were ice. Tromping inside, kicking off our boots, to be welcomed by Mom with a steaming mug of home-made cocoa (seriously the best cocoa on the face of the earth). As the days melted into one another with the onset of winter. The nights getting colder and longer, it was time for us to invite those special friends. The ones that would come to our gingerbread party. As soon as school let out for Christmas break there was a notable rise in the excitement around our house. Mother would get out the Kitchen-aid and the stained copy of the gingerbread recipe. Batch after batch would be mixed, refrigerated, rolled, cut, and baked. The smell was overpowering. After the first couple batches were baked you could begin to smell the gingerbread as far away as the barn. Oh it was wonderful! That smell could get us to come inside when nothing else could. Mom always made extra too, so that we could snitch cookies instead of parts of houses. The day after they were baked came the construction. This was the slightly tricky part. The "glue" that held the 
houses together was made from egg whites and powdered sugar, and it set fast. With four hands working though, the houses went up pretty fast. A dozen houses probably took around an hour to construct, so long as they all stayed together. The baking and construction had to take place at least a day before the decorating, so that the gingerbread had a chance to dry a little bit. Moist gingerbread tastes wonderful, but doesn't hold up well. So once the houses were a day old, then it was Party Time! Our friends would arrive and we would go crazy. Candy in bowls being sampled as well as added to houses. Multiple colors of
frosting, also sampled, became the glue with which the candy was held onto the houses. The talking and laughing, decorating and stickiness, lasted for a while. Then when everyone had pronounced their house done, Mom would take a picture. We'd then bundle up and giggle our way outside. Taking our sugar high to the sledding hill behind the barn. We'd sled until parents started coming to pick up friends and houses. The day only truly ended though, after we'd had our first bites of our house. MmmmHmmm. That gingerbread was good.
