Cookies and Gingerbread House

This year there was not nearly as much cookie baking as in years past. I made a few batches for a Cookie Exchange I host each year and one afternoon the kids and I, along with our neighbor, Arabella made and decorated cut-outs cookies. Other than that we had minimal baked goods in the house this holiday season, mostly because we would soon be heading out of the country. Another annual tradition for us is to decorate a gingerbread house. The kids were pretty independent doing it this year and when I went back to "fix it up", Ava told me to leave it just as it was--she and Karsten had decorated it. And so I did, which is really hard for me. One) because I do have some artistic ability and two) because I like things to look like they do in a magazine or on package. I need to recognize that the work of children does not look like a package and I am grateful for that!