Girls Night In: Gingerbread House Making

Recently I spied some super chic gingerbread houses in The Magnolia Journal and I told Matt, "I reallly want to make these!" I originally thought making them from scratch would be fun and he was like, "Are you nuts? Just buy the houses and then add your own decorations." Done!

I thought that maybe some of my friends would enjoy it too so I planned for a "Girls Night In!" I detailed what I did below so you can throw your own Gingerbread House Party this holiday season.

What you need
-gingerbread kit (I got mine at Target on sale for $9 each)
-outlining frosting (comes in kit)
-flooding frosting (recipe below)
- vanilla wafers
- mini marshmallows
-skinny pretzel sticks
-fresh rosemary sprigs (got mine from my running trail LOL)
-white sugar sprinkles (HERE)
-white pearl sprinkles (HERE)
- icing bottles (HERE)
- meringue powder (HERE)
-butcher or kraft paper (to protect your work surface)


Royal Icing Frosting Recipe
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 2.5 tablespoons warm water
-1.5 tablespoons meringue powder (Michaels)
* mix it all together. If you need your icing more runny (I usually do) then keep adding more warm water till the consistency easily spreads out when you fill in the cookie.

Tips for Your Gingerbread House Party
You can choose to get your guests either one large gingerbread house or 4 mini ones. The larger ones are definitely easier to decorate but the mini ones are easier to put together. Unbox the houses before your guests arrive. Otherwise there is too much trash everywhere and it makes for a big mess.

Make sure you do all your decorating BEFORE you put your house together...otherwise the royal icing will slide down the walls and roof. Make sure your icing is completely dry before you assemble your house...otherwise the icing will slide. It is best to have two people assembling the houses. It can be very frustrating trying to glue walls and holding them together with only one set of hands.

It would be best if you had one bottle of royal icing per guest. It is too hard to share since all the steps have to be done at the same time. Guests should "outline" their houses first which requires them to all use the firm icing first followed by the flooding icing second.

I put white butcher paper down on my table to protect it because once the frosting hardens it's like cement. It also made clean up easier because I just folded it all up and threw it away.

I hope this inspires you to have your own girls night in! Just add some hot cocoa (in a crock pot!) and a dessert and you're set! Oh, and wine never hurt anyone either. ;)