EXTREME GINGERBREAD MMX

 Some families are ambitious and decide to make gingerbread houses every year. My family is one of those families. Kind of.

I prefer to call our holiday tradition “EXTREME GINGERBREAD” and label each year with huge roman numerals like it’s the Superbowl. Or some great staged roman battle of epic proportions happening inside the Coliseum annually for the emperors and peasants alike to throw things at. It’s just that extreme. So I guess this year would be “EXTREME GINGERBREAD MMX”. Mind you, this year it doesn’t look as awesome because there are no Is littering the end of it and making it look more ancient and awesome.

Anyway, I do this because the gingerbread creations in our house are never just houses.

I suppose it all started many years ago... *flashbackflashbackflashbackdance*...when my parents decided they were going to make a castle. It was enormous, and awesome. It had little turrets and gingerman guards and a drawbridge and everything. We really went ALL out that year. Mind you, the weight of all the icing concrete pulled the thing down in the middle of the night some time between Christmas and New Years, but it was okay! Because Santa had seen our Herculean gingerbread efforts and appreciated them, and I had received a pogo stick.

The next year they made a farm. Anyway.

The next couple of years, my parents aspired to inspire independence in us and our gingerbread creations. There were a few years of crappy boring gingerbread houses. But the key was that we had to design our own gingerbread creations and make the floor plans. 

*cue in the montage music*
In retrospect, these years were training for the big leagues. They were years of learning about how gingerbread always takes a disappointingly different shape after going through the oven, and that the icing concrete was really like concrete: still liquidy for a while, and that this while was just long enough for your house to fall apart without proper support.

I don’t know what it was that inspired me, but  one year, I decided that things were going to be different.

I’ve mentioned that my family is made of geniuses, yes? And that I’m kind of smart because I skipped a grade and stuff, but I’m the black sheep because I’m a musical theatre major, right? Well my family loves math. Conversely, I’d always hated math up until Geometry. Geometry was the first year of math that I ever enjoyed. Geometry was a sparkling literal fortress of shapes in my mind which all fit together in perfectly logical ways. I was to spacial reasoning what my dog is to locating the squeaky part in chew toys and stuffed foxes.

It is my belief that my gingerbread lighthouse was a perfect example of me trying to prove that I was worthwhile, and in fact, still belonged in my family.

God I’m so messed up.

Anyway, I succeeded. And to counter everyone’s gingerbread skepticism, a gingerbread lighthouse sprang from my fingers.

And my parents put their fingers together as if creating a mountain with their fingers (like you’ve seen villains do in cartoons), and cackled diabolically because I’d fallen for their evil plan of continuing the gingerbread extremeness. Probably. That’s probably what they did.

For my genius and hard work had inspired my siblings to work harder.

The next few years of baking were awesome. I was invincible! 

 

And my awesomeness transcended beyond gingerbread and into cakes.

I made Shakespeare's "The Globe Theatre" out of chocolate chip pound cake for extra credit in Language Arts Class.

I made this for the best party that I ever had. It was an Indiana Jones party. I… I will probably explain this at a later time because it’s just too much awesome in one sitting.

Last year I attempted the awesome and unthinkable. I attempted a gingerbread creation that was not so mathematically precise. I made the gingerbread Coliseum.

If you will recall, the Coliseum is not made of rigid geometric shapes. It is, in fact, a circle. Circles are round. Gingerbread, my friends, is not.

I called my genius friend over and we designed an elaborate gingerbread-bending contraption.

It was not a complete failure. It did not look like the Coliseum… But I DID manage to get it looking like a circle with benches and stuff in the middle. In my book? Win.

But I felt that this year I had to do something truly impressive to make up for the Coliseum. I’d already fucked up one of the wonders of the world. (Is the Coliseum a wonder? I don’t remember, but for now it is.) But I didn’t want to have to go all out building gingerbread-contorting contraptions. It had to be exciting, yet simple, and do-able. Especially because this year my siblings joined the gingerbread competition with gusto.

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I created the great pyramids of Giza.

I know that this is probably what you're thinking:

But no! That's lame and sloppy and stupid! That's just some random triangles. THIS is what we're really talking about:

And because I feel the need to express how truly awesome it is, I'm going to give you a rare treat and show you a real pictures. Here’s an actual picture of the detailed awesomeness that is slated to win:

And you know what? Hell, here’s another one of the detailing for good measure!

I'm awesome.