Gingerbread

This year I was eager to put my (limited) knowledge of Google SketchUp to work designing our family's gingerbread masterpiece... our fifth entry in the Wilmot Gingerbread Contest.

One nasty habit of SketchUp that I found particularly annoying for this task, was the way it joins pieces together as you extend or overlap them. I was hoping for a parts list at the end of the design that I could use when baking, and following the tutorials wasn't getting me there. To get around this, I found that creating each piece separately and then turning it into a component would allow me to place the piece in the model without having it become part of the other pieces. In the end, I looked over the list of components for my list of pieces to bake.

It's that time of year again... time to start work on your entry for the 2009 Gingerbread Contest. For all of the rules and official contact information, check out the Indy blog at:

http://nhindependent.wordpress.com/2009-gingerbread-contest/

This will be our 5th year entering the contest. It's great to work with the family on a project from design to completion, and it's great to see all the creations that other people can come up with.

This year's theme is "Santa's Workshop".

The New Hamburg Gingerbread Festival theme has just been announced for 2008 in the New Hamburg Independent. The theme is:

"Christmas Movies"

Be sure to read the writeup in the New Hamburg Independent for details. If you have any questions, you can call the Gingerbread Hotline at 519-662-1082 ext. 61, or Kathryn Ritz at 662-2960.

Our family has entered the contest for the past 2 years and it's been a blast.

Update 2008/11/18: I'd like to encourage groups and organizations to enter as well as families and individuals. It's a great opportunity for school classes to get involved with the community (I know at least one class from Forest Glen Public School entered last year).

I also need to add a slight correction. The name of the contest is actually the "Wilmot Gingerbread House Contest 2008".

Update 2008/12/10: The NH Independent has a list of the winners and their blog has photos. Our entry for The Spark Centre got the winning nod in the VIP category. Yay!