Gingerbread Houses?

Yesterday Russ and I headed to the Grove Park Inn for lunch and to view the entries from their annual gingerbread house competition. We started out with lunch on the Sunset Terrace which is the large open back porch area off the grand lobby. It was a somewhat cloudy day but the air temperature was close to 70, so it was actually very pleasant to be eating outside. The terrace overlooks the Grove Park Inn Spa and golf course and then in the distance you can see the Asheville skyline and the backdrop of the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains beyond that. So even on a grey November day, the view is quite spectacular. If you go for lunch (the food is pretty darn good, too), I would recommend that you treat yourself to a Bloody Mary!

The gingerbread competition was judged on Monday and included a lot of traditional houses, most decked out for the holiday season. Lots had amazing details, like decorated rooms visible through faux windows, landscaping, lawn decorations, animals and people... it's really quite amazing! The grand prize winner was this shoe:

The stern looking woman you can see in the mirror was a guard that would not really let me, or anybody, close enough to get a detailed photo. She was placed there to protect the work until they could install a plexiglass box around it.

Since the winner was a non-traditional house, I thought I'd share a few of the other non-traditional gingerbread houses we saw.

Of course, I couldn't resist taking a picture of this sewing machine. Notice the basket with spools of thread, the scissors, and buttons. That is all 100% edible!
How about a Native American gingerbread house?
And this carousel horse:
The next two are from the teen or youth division:
Look at this chest full of edible Christmas ornaments!