A Charleston Gingerbread House Tea Party (8th Annual)

I’m overjoyed to share the photos of our 8th annual Gingerbread House Tea Party, this year in Charleston, SC. It was the sweetest day full of twinkling lights, fluffy gingerbread house icing, marshmallows and gum drops piled high and more!

gingerbread house tea party in charleston

If you’re new here or a returning reader back again, my family and I moved to Charleston this summer. My Mom also moved to downtown historic Charleston. I grew up here as a child, and it’s been such a joy to return to the place I love the most with my family!

Hosting these gingerbread house tea parties is a tradition that has become a beloved part of our family’s history. My Mom hosted gingerbread house Christmas tea parties for me growing up, and I carried on the tradition when my daughter was just 2 years old. The joy and laughter shared during this event have become the highlight of our holiday season.

Courtney Whitmore, Phronsie Dial, Pizzazzerie Gingerbread House Tea Party

Find more of our favorite links to invitations, gingerbread house tools, party decor, etc here in our Gingerbread House Resources!

One of our most-often asked questions is “How did you make the houses?” and while we adore actually *making* gingerbread houses, we like decorating them even more. We found that little ones lose steam when having to fully build their house before they get to decorate, so we get right to the fun part by pre-making our houses. Click below for a full video tutorial post.

HOW TO MAKE OUR GINGERBREAD HOUSES (Tutorial + VIDEO)
How to Make MINI Gingerbread Houses

Next up is the ICING! This is our favorite recipe for gingerbread house icing (and we have tried a LOT).

Gingerbread House Tea Party Charleston

Gingerbread House Candies

I had a few questions about the types of candies we like to use for our gingerbread houses. Depending on where you live and the humidity level (some peppermints and candy canes like to drip the red all over after a day or so)… here are a our “go to” candies…

  • Jellybeans
  • M&Ms
  • cinnamon red hots
  • gumdrops (large and small)
  • marshmallows (even fun colored ones)
  • Necco wafers
  • butter mints
  • gumballs
  • fruit slice chews
  • sprinkles (of all shapes and colors)
  • pretzel sticks
  • teddy grahams
  • gingerbread man cookies

In the non-edible category, we love to place a big ribbon bow on top of each house!

We also make small bows to pass out to the kids to add to their houses. Tiny decorative ornaments from craft stores (mini snowmen, Santas, trees, etc) are also fun to pass out. 

The possibilities here are infinite and your imagination will kick in as your architectural skills expand.

Pizzazzerie Gingerbread House Tea Party in Charleston

Gingerbread House Tea Party Table

We did a smaller table this year as we held it at my Mom’s downtown Charleston single house so space was tight, but it all worked out just fine.

For the little tables, I love the play tables from Pottery Barn Kids. For the chairs, I originally bought several from Chiavari Chair Co., but I found these almost exactly same ones on Amazon. They’re an investment, but we use them every year for so many occasions.

We used a pink and white check tablecloth layered with RosanneBeck’s Peppermint Round Posh Die-Cut Placemats! I also used their Peppermint Stripe Place Cards!

On the back of each chair, we hung our very favorite Bauble Stocking that I created alongside the Bauble Stocking team last year to match our annual party! You can find the Gingerbread Magic Bauble Stocking HERE! It was such an honor to work with Bauble Stockings, I absolutely love their their hand-stitched stockings are made for fair trade in Haiti. I encourage you to read more about the company and the stocking tradition on their website.

While I adore pink, I love different color schemes too so I published this post on Gingerbread House Parties by Color Scheme with ideas for boy parties and gender-neutral parties too!

I hope you’re inspired to host your own gingerbread house decorating party this Christmas season! So many of you have shared yours with me, and it always warms my heart!

If you have any questions about our party, please let me know!

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7 Comments

  1. Rinne Sade says:

    So very beautiful AND EXCITING !!!!

  2. Beautiful and so cute! What a sweet and wonderful tradition. So happy for you moving back to your home town. :)

  3. We had our first gingerbread house tea this year! Mothers, daughters and grandmothers!
    Please tell me how you wrap your houses to preserve and store!
    Thank you!

    1. Hi! In a large ziplock bag in a plastic bin is all you should need to do! Ideally in a dark, cool place.

  4. such cute ideas! where did u get the large clear bags yo wrap them for transporting home?

    1. Hi Kathy! We send them home in shallow tray boxes from hobby lobby, they always have them in their christmas section near paper plates. You might be referencing the large bags we set them in during the pandemic when we just dropped them off ready-to-be decorated at the girls’ doorstep. Those bags were bought at a local wholesale store. But for our regular party years (aka no pandemic) we just set them in those shallow boxes since they still need some more time to harden up.

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