With more than 400 submissions, we saw some fascinating gingerbread houses (ranches, cottages, and tree houses) inspired by your favorite Christmas songs, paintings, books, and time periods. Take a look at our favorite entries.

With candy cane columns and detailed furnishings, Wunderhamster's gingerbread dollhouse looks like a sweet place to live.

After collapsing two times, MarilynFL's first-ever gingerbread house is protected by a roof made from 8 pounds of chocolate shells.

Christmas lights inside peek through amber glass windows in FishelDesign's detailed gingerbread house.

Inspired by her love for the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas," nevie-pie painted a climbing pear tree onto her gingerbread house.

With "The Gingerbread Architect" and Martha's gingerbread and royal icing recipes, INeedPrettyThings and her mother-in-law spent a week working on their Victorian farmhouse, complete with Christmas lights and a blanket of snow.

Tamyl's gingerbread cottage was inspired by a Thomas Kinkade painting called "Mountain Paradise." She colored and shaped fondant to make the the stone fireplace and used ice cream cones to make the trees. The drifts of snow are made of rolled white fondant.

Perched high in a Rice Krispies tree and decorated with icicles, blue shutters, and a lace roof, Sara_and_Vanessa's gingerbread tree house took them 17 1/2 hours to complete. 

Laurarutkowski made this gingerbread castle from scratch, using homemade templates and oatmeal cans to make the towers.

Surrounded by gingerbread men, trees, and hearts, PetraV's whimsical house is deliciously lovable.

Lit from behind, abh75's gingerbread house is filled with fondant furniture and cookie paintings inspired by her favorite midcentury classics. There's plenty to see in this ranch, including a Noguchi table and a clock topped with raw spaghetti noodles and candy buttons.

With a graham cracker chimney and roof shingles made of Frosted Mini Wheats, mommyknows's log cabin seems like the perfect winter treat.

We'd love to cozy up in MaMaLaLa's Vermont farmhouse made with royal icing and fondant accents.

Modeled after her own house, sraedeke's lit gingerbread house has a living room with a Christmas tree and a portrait of her grandson.

Zombik's 35-by-48-inch gingerbread house took 48 hours to create and is completely edible.

With ages raging from 10 to 39, ajodesertrat's family put together this country house that includes a snowman painting, a Necco roof, a patio made from Nerds, a pretzel fence, and Jolly Rancher stained-glass windows.

Hlindamood's gingerbread barn, with a gum paste vegetable garden and gum paste buckeyes, is modeled after traditional Ohio barns -- complete with the state's bicentennial logo, which appears on one barn in each county in the state.

Sarah_ejd's gingerbread castle is decorated with icing, gumdrop bricks, snowflake-shaped sprinkles, and towers made from stacked cookies.

Inspired by the stately Rosedale homes that sit atop Mount Pleasant Road in Toronto, kkatb created an elegant house with gingerbread walls, chocolate windows, a chocolate-coated roof, and sugar landscaping.

Inspired by "The Three Little Pigs," jennifermb and her son created a gingerbread scene, complete with the pigs' houses and the Big Bad Wolf. The first little pig is shown losing his house to the wolf.

Made from gingerbread, eshafer's house is surrounded by a forest of  lovely Christmas trees.

Mykel67's gingerbread scene, filled with royal icing, features the beautiful Rialto Bridge in Venice, Italy.

MAReeder's gingerbread house, which was baked over chicken wire frames and attached to a gingerbread sole, is decorated with royal icing, buttercream icing, candies, pretzels, and cereal. To make gingerbread kids, she molded soft caramel candy and used icing for outlines and features.

Dusted with sugary snow and topped with a white star, garrigo's gingerbread house sparkles.

We'd love to spend a winter in DrWinnieND's Swedish gingerbread cottage, based on Martha's creation.