King Crab's Holiday Castle

The end of my last post sure sounded like I'd be keeping you all updated on the progress of the castle, didn't it? This is my first big house, and I had no idea how it would take over my life...nothing but the castle got done, and I mean nothing...then there was the wedding cake...and then Thanksgiving...

Now, on to the building!

After baking the pieces I used poured sugar to make the windows, and then did the preliminary decorating (iced the flat pieces).

Then I added some bling around the windows.

When all of that was dry it was time to start building. Because the castle was so big it needed to have internal supports inside each of the three sections. The holes in the back were for lights.

The basic frame of the house is done. The crab, crown, and front door curtain are gum paste.

When the framing was done I threaded the lights through all the inside pieces. I love gingerbread houses with lights; they really add a neat dimension.

The towers were constructed from 5 long pieces each.

I used 55 pieces total for the 11 towers.

I used icing to give the towers a rounded look. After the icing had set for a few minutes and developed a crust, I used a spatula to mess up the crust and give the icing a "sand" look.

I used chocolate rocks to make a dam for the poured sugar water.

The tower tops are made out of rice krispie treat; the rice krispie's were Cookies and Cream, or something like that, which gave the cones a pebbly look :) I molded the shells out of chocolate. The flags are gum paste (thanks, Sheree!).

And the finished castle.

Me and the castle at the festival. Do I look very happy to be done, and delirious from getting only 6 1/2 hours of sleep combined over the last three days? ;)