Gingerbread Magic: it is a little known fact that I am painfully shy. Social situations make me soooo nervous, but I get over them with my humor, and if I am lucky there will be a punch bowl I can hover around.  I usually tag along with a friend, but sometimes, you have to do it all on your own.  Over Christmas I got to decorate the gingerbread houses over in the Sundance Resort General Store.  At first I was a titch mortified, all those rich skiers watching me! What if I messed up, what if the designs in my head didn't transfer to the houses, what if, what if, what if. But there was no time, so up from the bowels of the Sundance kitchens I went, armed with 2 blank houses, bags of royal icing, and a few cake tins of the bits and pieces of colorful splendor I could find in the bakery. It started out rocky, my hands were shaky, heart was pounding, then I saw him....a beautiful face. It was a saving grace, not because it was handsome {but that helped} but because I knew I could get his attention.  I said, "get over here and help me" and I winked at his bystander friends. Wouldn't you know it, this total stranger came over and stuck on a candy cane. Then a little boy, maybe 6, who couldn't keep his eyes off it, he stepped up on my bended knee and placed the yellow gumdrops, then 3 sisters who placed the pretzels, a grandfather, a couple on a date, a skier, a group of friends out for lunch....and so on. Whoever gazed for more than a moment was caught in the wonder and helped with the creation. Before I knew it the houses were done and they had been touched by almost 100 unexpecting hands.  The houses were better than I had anticipated, and what had began as my worry, had turned into splendor. They may have been more crisp and exact had I done them in the quiet of the kitchen at 5am, but they would have been void of life.  My own life would be so crisp and exact if I were alone, but oh the joy, personality, and wonder that comes when it is touched by others.  Merci mes amis. 

{the 2 on the left were the houses I did with the help of the Sundance guest'}