Torture and Christmas traditions

The gingerbread crowd

Years ago, my son Jeffrey created a memorable gingerbread house.
While the other kids in the family were busy decking their houses with candy corn and gum drop stars, Jeffrey was making a gummy bear torture chamber.
Outside, he had frosted the windows and doors and put little silver balls on the roof in a serious, well-ordered series of lines.
But inside his little graham cracker house, gummy bears were stuck to the walls and the ceiling.

Brayden's house

For a while, it worried me a little that this charming but goofy child had such a warped sense of Christmas but as the years marched on, I realized Jeffrey just likes to do things people don't expect.
He isn't willing to conform, especially when there's an opportunity to break out and do something really different.
In ceramics class, he made snakes and robots that could take over the world.
He's always been an inventive lad.

Adell and her dad's house

Now, his sons are following in his lopsided footsteps.
Brayden announced at our annual gingerbread house activity that he was going to make a torture house.
He soon had a couple of other grandsons doing the same.
So while we had a lot of pretty houses we also had these structures stabbed with toothpicks.

Kyle working away

Adell made a masterpiece with snowflakes and candy canes working alongside her dad "the greatest artist in the world" in her mind.
Alyson worked with colored M&Ms.

Alyson designing

Fiona tried everything she could reach while Kyle laboriously decked his walls with green chocolate chips, a tough task for five-year-old fingers.
We had a whole tableful of busy children working with all kinds of candy and getting all kinds of sticky while enjoying a sample of a wealth of sweet treats.
It's a tradition for us and we all look forward to it, as I'm sure many families do.
I'd just like to know if anyone else's table sports a torture trove?