Our gingerbread house decorating contest

In a whim to gather some dear friends together we see not oft enough, we threw a Yuletide brunch in our little home over the weekend. I thoroughly love time well spent with sweet chums, and we celebrated with fresh omelettes, garlic potatoes with parmesan, chicken apple sausage, and macadamia nut pancakes with all the fixins', particularly speculoos (cookie butter), of which I cannot get enough these days, and coconut syrup. An assortment of Christmas cookies made their appearance as well (in part thanks to Trader Joe's, and in part thanks to dear friend Dorothy from Cupcake and Cookie), but the starring sweet treat was a gingerbread house decorating contest. I hadn't made a gingerbread house in ages, and thought it might be fun to do so with a group of friends, specifically via a little contest for teams to craft their best embellished gingerbread edifice. I baked gingerbread the evening before, and acquired peppermints, gumdrops, licorice, sour straws, sprinkles, and frosting for the task. Three teams represented, and we meant to proclaim the winner due to each gingerbread house's number of likes on Instagram, but the husband requested that any readers of this little blog would chime in with your vote for the best gingerbread house. We'd love for you to help us make our decision, and we thank you kindly in advance!