Christmas at Lilac Cottage - Holly Martin Page 0,96
year.’
‘Maybe. And this must be your lovely family.’ Edward smiled at Penny and Daisy.
Penny froze, not sure what to say, whether to confirm or deny it. Were there really strict rules that meant only families were allowed to take part? Would Henry get into trouble for having someone who wasn’t his family on his team? Should she be holding hands with Henry and pretending to be the adoring wife?
‘Yes, this is Penny and Daisy,’ Henry said, without missing a beat.
Edward shook both their hands. ‘Well, I hope you both have fun today, may the best team win.’ He quickly consulted his clipboard. ‘You’re in Bay 6.’
Henry ushered them inside. As soon as they were out of hearing distance, Daisy wrapped an arm round Penny’s shoulders.
‘Hear that? You’re our family now, you’re stuck with us.’
Penny’s heart leapt with happiness. ‘I can’t think of a nicer family to be stuck with.’
Henry smiled at them as they stepped into their designated bay before turning his attention to the materials and tools.
He prodded the plastic gingerbread panels, feeling the weight of them and looked over at the oversized plastic sweets which were arranged in neat piles around the edge of their bay, some of them spilling out of a large cardboard box. He gave the icing a stir, letting the mixture fall back into the bowl as he judged its consistency.
‘How does this work then, how do we win?’ Daisy asked, obviously taking the competition as seriously as her dad.
‘Well, we get points for being the fastest to finish. First team to finish gets ten points, but then the second team to finish will get nine points and it goes down incrementally, so even if we are last to finish we still get points. The structure has to be sturdy too: if you finish first but your house collapses before the end of the competition then you can be disqualified if there is no time for you to fix it. We then get points for style, creativity and originality which are judged by Linda from the bakery and Summer from the sweet shop. They will award points out of ten for each team too. There are mini prizes awarded for the fastest team and the best team in the design stakes and then an overall winner.’
‘Surely the overall winner would be one of the mini prize winners,’ Daisy said, picking up a giant plastic Jelly Tot and playing with it in her hands.
‘Not necessarily. Getting high points for finishing first but low points in design would give you an average overall score, where getting an average score for both, say seven or eight, would give you a much higher score overall. Basically we want to work quickly but not forsake the design aspect too; we can’t afford to have it look shoddy.’
The spectators had already filled up the seats but still more were coming in, happy to pay to stand and watch.
The inside of the marquee was already decorated with tiny fairy lights, hung in looped boughs across the windows. It was all going to look magical once it was set up for the ball, which was only three days away.
‘Are there any rules?’ Henry said.
‘No, you can’t help or hinder another group and other than the fact our gingerbread house has to still be standing at the end of the race, we can do whatever we want.’
‘We need a strategy,’ Daisy said. ‘We need to do something different to everyone else.’
Henry stood up and joined their little huddle. ‘What are you suggesting?’
Daisy looked around, thoughtfully. ‘We can use everything in the bay, right?’
Penny nodded.
‘How about that cardboard box?’ Daisy asked.
Penny looked over at the huge box that was filled with some of the smaller foam and plastic sweets.
‘We could use it, what were you thinking?’
‘A porch or a dormer.’
‘A dormer would be tricky to do, but I love the idea of a porch, we can decorate it too so it doesn’t just look like a box,’ Henry said.
‘We can use the rope as some kind of snowy garland that we can drape from the roof,’ Penny said, getting into the spirit of a little bit of cheating.
‘Let’s do it,’ Henry said, that wonderful look of mischief in his eyes.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Edward called over the microphone. ‘Please will you take your seats, the Giant Gingerbread House Race is about to start.’
There were cheers and claps from the crowds and then Edward called for silence.