Making a Sugar Cookie "Gingerbread" House

 Alec really wanted to try making his own gingerbread house this year without using a premade kit.  We talked about how we never really eat the house since they don't taste very good.  Years ago we gave up on the frosting that comes in the kit and began making our own so we thought perhaps we should try making our our house too.

Only problem is that no one in the house likes gingerbread.  We talked about trying to make the house using a sugar cookie recipe.  Alec was so excited at that idea since he just LOVES sugar cookies.  

He found a recipe online for a simple sugar cookie recipe and mixed up the dough. 

He rolled it out an cut it to the size of our cookie sheets-- we had read that it's easiest to cut the house pieces out after the dough has been baked and is still warm and soft because then you don't have to worry about any of the pieces losing their shape while baking.

I had picked out a simple cookie cutter set on Amazon and as soon as the cookies came out of the oven we began pressing the cutters into them. 

The front, back, and two sides with windows and doors cut into them. 

The roof pieces (the squares and pac-manish shaped pieces were for a chimney we didn't use)

We let the cookies sit at room temperature for about an hour and then stored them in an air tight container overnight.

The next morning Alec mixed up some buttercream frosting (we don't like royal icing even though that is what is normally used).  He filled his piping bag and set to work.

We like to have our candy easily accessible in little glass jars.  

While he worked on decorating his walls I decided to put together the kit I had bought.  I always thought it looked like fun to decorate a gingerbread house but never had the change to really do one.  

We had read that it is supposed to be easier to decorate the house in flat pieces and then assemble so we decided to give that a try this year. Once we each had all our walls mostly done we let them dry and firm up a little before putting the houses together. 

I can't say this was any easier than decorating a pre-assembled house but we both did add a few extra decorations after the houses were assembled.   Alec is so proud of his house and how it came out and I just know all three boys can't wait to start tearing pieces off of it to eat. 

Mine from the kit with a few added candy pieces from our stash:

Have you ever tried making your own gingerbread house?

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