Here are the entries from the GBH contest I helped set up at work:

Okay, here's my gingerbread sign for the contest.

I didn't enter the contest because I was the point-of-contact for help and panic calls. I also helped make up the rules and judging criteria. The top curve and the bottom section are gingerbread. The letters are white and dark chocolate, the red striping & LM star are fondant and the LM blue background is tinted royal icing.

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/Finer_Kitchens/Marilyn_CakeBalls/GBH_Sign_2009.jpg

 
I LOVE the little row of houses at the bottom! And the candy pieces. Did you make

both of them, and are they gingerbread? You are so talented (but we knew that!).

 
D, I made a 6-piece house to show at the workshop and cannabilized that.

since I hadn't glued it together and I really didn't want to waste any more food to make gingerbread. I pieced two of the longer sides of the house for the bottom. If you were to look at Mary Englebrit's Christmas book, I COMPLETELY STOLE that roof top scene from her. So it's actually one long piece of gingerbread painted with royal icing, but her design. God Bless Xerox.

The top curve was a roof section from the demo house. I used a big soup bowl to cut the arc and a smaller dish to mark where the cutouts should go. I cut out holes with a cookie cutter and put crushed candy it that. Always stayed sticky, this being Florida, Land of Humidity Hell.

 
...and the lettering is a Xerox'd image piped with chocolate.

I did the lettering on the computer, enlarged it to fit the area on the 16x20 canvas and then printed it out.

The concept is explained in Whimsical Bakehouse and worked MUCH easier years ago before they started messing around with the density of the chocolate disks. And I wasn't brain-dead when it came to adjusting the power of my microwave.

I separated the words into a workable size, flipped the Xerox copy over, taped it down, then taped a piece of waxed paper over that. Melted (but first burnt, then burnt more, then burnt more) chocolate candy disks and piped/traced out each letter. Chilled that, then flooded the surrounding background area with white chocolate candy disks. The white chocolate needs to be melted, but then cooled to around body temp so it doesn't melt the dark chocolate. Test on wrist like you're testing baby formula. Chill to firm.

Flipped right-side up and mounted it on the canvas with lots of pillowy Royal icing to fill in the gaps since it wasn't a flat surface. Otherwise the white chocolate would have cracked.

Then I added edible dots to the front. Boy, those are a pain to work with when you have chubby fingers. Since I knew it was just for display, I glued the dots on with real glue.

 
Nicely done! I think it is great that you were able to encourage others to try their best to

contribute! I am sure that a great time will be had by all that participated! Kudos for you to come up with an idea that will increase morale and put smiles on the employees!

Great Job!!

 
Cindy, I'd say about 10 hours total, done over 3 days

I did it in stages:

>> Made the candy letters first to confirm that idea would work. I've had many interesting (read: weird) ideas that just didn't work. This had huge potential to be one of those.

>> Covered a 16x20 canvas board with blue tinted Royal icing and left that to dry completely.

>> Cut out the rough outline for the rooftop scene using an enlarged Xerox for a pattern. With so much humidity in the air, the leftover gingerbread panels from the workshop had softened again, so I cut out what I needed, then rebaked them for 40 minutes to harden.

>> Made the striped edging with red and white fondant and shaped those around the borders.

>> Painted the roof top scene with tinted Royal Icing using Mary Englebrit's artwork as my model. Mounted that with more Royal Icing.

>> Mounted the words, added the edible beads.

>> Added the battery-run lights (those were a disappointment. They only lasted 7 hours and were really too big for the design. Then I piped over the edges with...say it with me....more Royal Icing.

>> Made that horrid LM Star logo out of fondant. Since each contest entry HAD to include a LM Star as one of the rules, I wanted to show solidarity for my GBH virgin comrads.

Is that everything? Let me peek back to the photo and see...

Oh, before I rebaked the curved gingerbread offset, I made cut-outs with a small cookie cutter and filled the holes with crushed candy.

When it was all composed, I added some mini-packages and candy and one little gingerbread guy. I tried to pipe on a blue LM badge like we all have to wear, but it ended up looking like he was modeling a blue thong.

That's when he leaped off the canvas and ran away to Brazil.

 
Your sign is wonderful Marilyn and you had to be so pleased with the

entries. They are really superb. I loved the stilt home. Terrific!!!

 
Actually, my sciatic nerve has been killing me all this week from standing on the cement floor for

so many hours. That'll show me.

 
oh, another thing we have in common! I have to wear hard sole slippers in my ceramic tile kitchen

or my back and legs ache for days. I have radiant heat on my wish list. I can run it underneath w/o tearing up the floor since the crawl space is right under the kitchen and the lines can be run under the floor. well, someday.

 
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