This was a smaller project this year due to limited time and resources. There were no inside scenes, so this was created rather quickly. The gingerbread pieces were baked on December 23 and assembly began on December 24.
We started with the design patterns, cut out from freezer paper. The hardest part was estimating the rooftop wedge size to make the pieces fit evenly.
We made extra carousel horses in case any broke during decorations, and we had a few broken legs. In the end, we only used three carousel horses and one Santa sleigh.
Here are the total pieces. You can see how they are separated into four groups: The first group has seven baked pieces, the second group includes six more, etc. This is for our “Gingerbread Guessing Game” that we play with 15 of our family and friends. On Day 1, I text a picture of only the first seven pieces to see if they can guess what we’re building. The guesses were: a church, a castle, a windmill, Santa’s workshop, SkyPark/Santa’s Village. On Day 2, 13 pieces were sent out and we already had a winning guess! That was fast! The horses were in the last group on purpose since that was the biggest clue to reveal a carousel.
I added a wooden dowel in the middle from the bottom level to the top of the roof to support the wedges, then four more dowels on the bottom to support the roof. I wrapped the outside dowels in fondant then added a red stripe with an edible marker.
The stained glass in the middle of the bottom level is crushed life saver candies. I baked the gingerbread for 2/3 of the time, added the crushed candies, then baked the rest of the time so the candies could melt.
I used some elastic to hold the middle pieces together after securing them with royal icing. The top wedges were the hardest to get straight…I needed four hands at the same time, so Chuck helped. Once they were even, we secured them with blue tape (not the sticky side) so they could harden overnight.
I used some tiny little lights that had a very small battery pack that I could easily hide in Santa’s sleigh. The lights were secured to the underside of the roof, down through the middle section of the stained glass then out to the bottom floor.
Next were the carousel horses. They were first piped with royal icing, then flow icing was added.
I only needed a small amount of colored icing for the saddles. The last step was to secure them to the red licorice with royal icing and let them dry hard.
The roof top and sleigh were covered with red and white fondant. A little water on a paint brush helps secure the seams.
Santa was also made with fondant, then royal icing was added for the beard and various white parts of his outfit.
The battery pack for the lights were hidden under the M&M’s in Santa’s sleigh.
I always hide extra candy somewhere to be found, so I hid some in the ticket booth. You’ll also see M&M’s and BelVita snack cookies around the edge of the carousel roof. The pathway bricks are the cookie snacks we received on a Southwest Airlines flight recently.
We used the same rotating disk that we used on the Cuckoo Clock to make the Carousel turn.
Tricia had the winning guess, so she had first pick of the candy before the destruction process!
We even got the little ones involved with their hammers, being trained by their expert fathers!
Another fun year of gingerbread fun come and gone!
The End!