Tim Stewart wasn’t much of a baker, he said the other day. He didn’t cook all that often, either. The reason he and two other Phoenicians took top honors in the 28th annual National Gingerbread House Competition is that they worked as a team. “This is not something I would have tackled on my own,” Stewart admitted. “You wouldn’t believe how much time goes into a sugar art project. It’s time-consuming, it’s tedious. I have a new appreciation for people who build edible houses.” Stewart’s winning project wasn’t a house so much as a teeny holiday boutique filled with candy shoppers browsing spruce pines and baskets of Shiny Brites. “St. Nick’s Christmas Décor Shop” is made up of more than 5,000 individual pieces that took more than 1,000 hours to assemble. For his part, Stewart figured his contribution ate up 150 hours over a six-week period.