Holiday Home Decorating
by Wayne Laepple
Sunbury's YMCA Arts Center on South Fifth Street gets decked for the holidays, just like most other homes. But on Dec. 5, houses inside the center will get decorated during the annual "Gingerbread" House Workshop. The quotes are around gingerbread because these houses are made of foam core board rather than graham crackers or gingerbread. "They're actually candy houses," explains Mary Jo Tavares, arts center director. "They won't fall apart like real gingerbread houses." This is the fifth year for the workshop. Last year, there were 55 people from 16 families working on houses. "The same families keep coming back. It's become their traditional way to start the holiday season," Tavares says. Several come with their children, and everyone takes part in decorating the houses.
"It's almost like a competition between families, to see who can make the most ornate house." She laughs as she recalls a couple of men who were dragged to the workshop by their wives, muttering and grumbling about wasting a whole afternoon. Now, she says, they are really into it, and their wives have to drag them away at the end of the afternoon. Tavares and Scott Onsager, the center's art director, cut out and assemble the houses before the workshop. They set up a couple of 8-foot banquet tables in the center's foyer, where participants find containers filled with all sorts of candies, breakfast cereals and other edibles with which to decorate their houses.
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