How to Make a Giant Gingerbread Nutcracker

 

This past weekend I finally finished a Christmas craft that I had hoped to have finished a few weeks ago.  Being sick two times in the last month, I had to delay the project just a bit. 

Standing in the corner of our dining room there now stands a five foot tall gingerbread boy.  I am just over 5 feet tall, and we are approximately the same height.  

This past Halloween I made six foot monster nutcrackers that stood our our porch greeting the trick or treaters. I had hoped to share a blog post on how to make them, but I finished the witch so last minute, I decided to write a post on how to make a Christmas standing nutcracker. Both sizes of nutcrackers are made the same way, and can be decorated any way you want. 

I used three regular size Dollar Tree laundry baskets to make the taller monsters, and three smaller baskets to make the gingerbread. 

All three nutcrackers use the same legs. You will need a piece of foam board for each leg, and a pizza pan for the base.  Roll each piece of foam board, and secure it with a couple of zip ties. I then used a combination of E6000 and hot glue to attach the legs to the pizza pan. 

One reason why I chose to make the gingerbread man a with the smaller baskets is because it uses less poster board. I used a 3 1/2 pieces of brown poster board that I bought from Hobby Lobby for only 99 cents.  I used two pieces to cover the baskets.

I used thin strips of poster board to cover where I attached the poster board on each side. It will be covered with part of a pool noodle for the arms. 

When making the larger nutcrackers I needed up to 6 pieces of different colored poster board.  I used purple, black and green for the monsters. 

I used part of a poster board to shape the head, and then I cut out a circle to cover it.  You will also need a circle to cover the body, so the head has something to sit on. I have about half a poster board left. 

I used craft foam to make the gingerbread's face and buttons. I did get a little more detailed, and made some 3D features on the monsters. The gingerbread man is a little more simple with flat circles and wavy icing pieces. 

I glued on the craft foam details and the pool noodle arms. Each arm is a little less than half a noodle.  I still might add a few more details. 

I found a couple of peppermints in a package of gingerbread house wall decor (also from the Dollar Tree)  I had made a little peppermint tree out of a styrofoam cone and a strand of tinsel.  I sat it on his head just to see what it would look like. It kind of looks like a peppermint hat.  :) 

He now stands in the corner of the dining room in what is being decorated in a gingerbread theme.