STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK

Brook Vagias was but 13 when she won second place in Sun Valley Resort’s inaugural Community Gingerbread House contest with Ra-Pretzel’s Tower, a towering house based on the fairy tale of Rapunzel.

Vagias is back this year with a new creation—The Magic Treehouse, made out of pretzel logs perched on the branches of a tree. A Lifesaver wreath hangs on the door; a red licorice ladder climbs up to the door.

As with last year, Vagias created the one-of-a-kind gingerbread concoction on behalf of the Friends of the Hailey Public Library, which raises funds to meet library needs. Vagias, a prolific reader, won the $2,000 second-place prize last year to be used for the children’s library and she hopes to win big again this year.

The teen-ager’s gingerbread house is one of a dozen entered in the second annual Community Gingerbread House contest, which Sun Valley Resort started last year to raise money for the valley’s nonprofits. Last year the resort also gave an $500 Honorable Mention award to a gingerbread school campus created by I Have a Dream Foundation-Idaho, now Far+Wise, because the race for third place was so close.

The gingerbread creations can be seen in The Boiler Room in Sun Valley Village through New Year’s Day. Viewers can cast a vote for their favorite via cell phone.

This year Chris and Kelsey Strahle have created a Harry Pawter Christmas on behalf of Mountain Humane. They’ve used acorns for the fire ring, cinnamon sticks for logs and vanilla wafer steps leading to a cottage made of pretzel bits that evokes the magical cottages of Godric’s Hollow.

Adeline Jacoby created a Sweet Retreat on behalf of Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation. And the ziggy zaggy tilted house is sweet indeed with walls made of graham crackers, a roof made of Chex, gutters made of M&Ms and rainbow-colored candy canes and wavy lines of icing emphasizing the tilted nature of the house.

The staff and volunteers of Far+Wise, an organization that provides tutoring, enrichment and other resources for students, built a village of six cabins around a central fire pit. The creation is based on the African proverb that it takes a village to raise a child.

The fire pit is ringed by tiny gingerbread men iced in all colors holding hands. Each house is unique, with a popcorn roof on one and a decorative orange slice and sunflower seeds on another.

“It was a fun experience. Everyone loved firing up their creative juices,” said builder Lisa Dirksmeier, also a teacher with the afterschool program.

Dirksmeier said she and her fellow gingerbread house builders intentionally used lots of edible, natural materials as opposed to candy, striving to evoke warm nature-like vibes akin to the unique geographical surroundings of Sun Valley’s mountain community. Items such as dried fruits, grains, seeds, pretzels, cereal, crackers, oatmeal were sourced at the local grocery stores and the unexpected, delightful find of a dried star fruit inspired a change to the backdrop from daytime to nighttime.

“The mountainscape on the backdrop was created in detail from a photo of our local Pioneer Mountains. The peace sign light was a lucky, $3 find at one of our local thrift stores. We created the backdrop using a masonry trowel to texture and apply the royal icing to the cardboard as opposed to your typical kitchen spatula or knife,” Dirksmeier said. “We wanted our entry to showcase inclusion and different cultures, and as such, we frosted our circle of gingerbread people  in varying shades of skin colors.”

Nora Jacoby created a Country Charm Farm to benefit Swiftsure Ranch. Part of the roof fell in on the barn, but that happens to barns.

The Yoga Gals from the YMCA built an A-frame holiday log cabin on behalf of The Advocates, using  pretzels, mini-Triscuit crackers and Payday candy bars for building materials. Santa’s boots made out of red licorice and soles of almond slices sit on top of the chimney. At the bottom: a firepit made out of gumdrops, burnt croutons, pretzel logs with stools made of licorice and almond slices.

The Senior Connection replicated The Senior Connection with a cute little pretzel fence decorated with green icing holly and red hots and Meals on Wheels vans covered in white frosting.

And they weren’t the only ones replicating nonprofits around town. Mike Howard recreated The Argyros and others recreated the Sun Valley Museum of Art.