MDBCs 12 Dec 2023

This unofficial holiday celebrates the tradition of making houses and architectural models out of gingerbread cookies. The tradition can be traced back to the 1600s.

How to Celebrate?

Make your own gingerbread house. Maybe try and recreate a architectural landmark with gingerbread?
Take part in your local gingerbread house competition or hold one of your own!

Did You Know…

….that according the Guinness Book of World Records, the World’s largest gingerbread house was made in 2013 by the Traditions Club in Bryan, Texas, United States? The house was 60 ft (18.23 m) long and 10.1 ft (18.28m) tall.

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Q: What's a good holiday tip?

A: Never catch snowflakes with your tongue until all the birds have gone south for the winter.

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FYI: By the end of the Twelve Days of Christmas song, your home is crammed with 23 flying Birds and 50 hyperactive Humans.

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Greeting Cards:

When you care enough to send the very best but not enough to actually write something.

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Spending more time with family:

Families are complicated enough, but things became even more confusing after my father decided to get married to my brother's mother-in-law. "Now I can't make up my mind whether he's my dad or my father-in- law," says my brother, "or if my mother-in-law is now my stepmother, or whether my child is my daughter or my niece."

Getting in shape:

A friend of mine had resisted efforts to get him to run with our jogging group until his doctor told him he had to exercise. Soon thereafter, he reluctantly joined us for our 5:30 a.m. jogs on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. After a month of running, we decided that my friend might be hooked, especially when he said he had discovered what "runner's euphoria" was. "Runner's euphoria," he explained, "is what I feel at 5:30 on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays."

Starting that diet:

My friend Kimberly announced that she had started a diet to lose some pounds she had put on recently. "Good!" I exclaimed. "I'm ready to start a diet too. We can be dieting buddies and help each other out. When I feel the urge to drive out and get a burger and fries, I'll call you first." "Great!" she replied. "I'll ride with you."

Quitting smoking:

I discussed peer pressure and cigarettes with my 12-year-old daughter. Having struggled for years to quit, I described how I had started smoking to "be cool." As I outlined the arguments kids might make to tempt her to try it, she stopped me mid-lecture, saying, "Hey, I'll just tell them my mom smokes. How cool can it be?"

Eating healthier: The teacher in our Bible class asked a woman to read from the Book of Numbers about the Israelites wandering in the desert. "The Lord heard you when you wailed, 'If only we had meat to eat!' " she began. "Now the Lord will give you meat. You will not eat it for just one day, or two days, or five, or ten or twenty days, but for a month—until you loathe it." When the woman finished, she paused, looked up, and said, "Hey, isn't that the Atkins diet?"

Reducing your debt:

Neighbors of ours had a terrible disagreement over a patio they wanted for their backyard. The wife had rather grand ideas, while the husband wanted costs kept to a minimum. The wife won out, and the construction bill climbed higher and higher. I dropped by one day, when the patio was near completion, and was surprised to find the husband smiling from ear to ear as the workmen smoothed over the surface. I remarked how nice it was to see a grin replace the frown he had been wearing lately. “You see where they’re smoothing that cement?” he replied. “I just threw my wife’s credit cards in there.”

Learning new things:

I was trying to decide what to do for a talent show I planned to enter. Trusting my mother to help me out, I asked, "For the show, what do you think I should do, sing or put on a comedy act?" Glancing up from her paper, she said dryly, "What's the difference?"

Better teeth care:

Just because one owns a business doesn't mean it has to be all business. This sign in a dentist's office proves that point: "Be True to Your Teeth, or They Will Be False to You."

Becoming more organized:

My friend’s husband is always telling her that housekeeping would be a snap if only she would organize her time better. Recently he had a chance to put his theory into practice while his wife was away.

When I popped in one evening to see how he was managing, he crowed, "I made a cake, frosted it, washed the kitchen windows, cleaned all the cupboards, scrubbed the kitchen floor, walls and ceiling and even had a bath." I was about to concede that perhaps he was a better manager than his wife, when he added sheepishly, "When I was making the chocolate frosting, I forgot to turn off the mixer before taking the beaters out of the bowl, so I had to do all the rest."

Drinking less:

I was waiting tables in a noisy lobster restaurant in Maine when a vacationing Southerner stumped me with a drink order. I approached the bartender. "Have you ever heard of a drink called 'Seven Young Blondes'?" I asked. He admitted he'd never heard of it, and grabbed a drink guidebook to look it up. Unable to find the recipe, he then asked me to go back and tell the patron that he'd be happy to make the drink if he could list the ingredients for him. "Sir," I asked the customer, "can you tell me what's in that drink?" He looked at me like I was crazy. "It's wine," he said, pronouncing his words carefully, "Sauvignon blanc."

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When my daughter, Brooxie, was 5 years old, she’d stay with my husband’s parents while we were at work. One day Brooxie was helping Papaw gather eggs.

While putting the eggs into the basket she was carrying, she asked, “Papaw, where do these eggs come from?”

Papaw then explained in detail the delicate process of making an egg.

Brooxie put her hands on her hips and exclaimed, “Papaw, I don’t eat anything that comes out of a chicken!” And for many years, she didn’t.