DIY: How to Build an African-Themed Gingerbread Geodesic Dome

Thousands of readers around the world fell in love with <a href="http://scoutregalia.com/">Scout Regalia's</a> awesome <a href="http://inhabitat.com/diy-make-your-own-gingerbread-geodesic-dome-house/">geodesic gingerbread dome</a> last Christmas, and so did we - which is why we decided to put one together ourselves with an extra special African touch. We ordered our dome kit from the designers and had it shipped to family members in Virginia who were en route to <a href="http://inhabitat.com/interview-with-south-africas-hemp-expert-tony-budden/">South Africa</a>, where this author is currently based. It took a while, but we finally managed to build our sustainable gingerbread home with a lot of help from Tafline's talented Aunt! Step into our gallery to see images of this super fun project coming together in a quaint kitchen just a stone's throw from Johannesburg.

<h3>MATERIALS:</h3> - Scout Regalia Gingerbread Geodesic Dome kit - Gingerbread ingredients - Icing ingredients - Mixing bowl - Rolling pin - Icing applicator - Mixer - Baking sheet - Candies, sprinkles, herbs, toothpicks, and other decorations

<h3>STEP 1:</h3> First you have to measure out the dry ingredients: 1 Tablespoon cinnamon, 1 Tablespoon ground ginger, 1 teaspoon ground cloves, 1 teaspoon baking soda, 2 cups all-purpose flour, 1/2 cup brown sugar, and then the wet ingredients: 1/2 cup butter at room temperature, 1/4 cup of molasses, and 2 Tablespoons cold water.

These are the directions provided by Scout Regalia: In a large bowl, mix together butter, brown sugar, and molasses. In a separate bowl, combine all dry ingredients. Slowly stir dry ingredients into the butter mixture, adding water as you mix, Shape into a ball, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Roll out dough. Place patters on the dough and cut around each piece with a sharp knife. You'll cut 10 large hexagons, 6 small pentagons, 5 half-hexagons. Place the pieces onto a greased cookie sheet and bake for 15 minutes or until firm. Transfer onto a wire rack and let the pieces cool completely. We waited a day and did the next step the following day.

Our dough.

Again from Scout Regalia: Mix all ingredients on medium speed with an electric hand mixer until icing is smooth. Icing should have the consistency of caulk or spackle, and should be thick enough to hold form but thin enough to go through a pasty bag. Add more powdered sugar or vanilla extract as needed. Place the icing in the icing applicator and in the fridge until you're ready to use it, but be quick, because we found it hardens quite quickly.

<h3>STEP 3:</h3> Now you're ready to make your Gingerbread Geodesic Dome look like it was built in Africa! We added chocolate sprinkles to the roof so that they would resemble traditional thatched housing and added sprinkles to the remaining icing so that our land would appear rocky and dry - like it is in parts of Africa. We lucked out by finding a bag of little wooden zebras, lions, and buck, without which no African landscape is complete, and then added herbs from our garden and other greenery that resemble the iconic Acacia tree. Although we cheated a bit by adding a few non-edibles, but we hope you love it all the same!

<h3>STEP 2:</h3> Now it's time to make the icing. You'll need 4 cups of powdered sugar, sifted if lumpy, 1 large egg white, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, an icing applicator, candies, sprinkles, coconut, etc.

We then added our cooled pieces to the dome, which we put together using tape

The beginning stages of our decorating project

And voila! The African Geodesic Dome is complete!