Lace Points

I watched the Grovepark Inn competition on the Food Network in December of 2005. On that show, Deni Cole made intricate lace points and glued them to the eaves of her gingerbread house. Normally, these lace points are made out of piped royal icing. Deni, however, used a different medium; she said that she found a way to liquify pastillage or gum paste by adding gum arabic. She then piped the mixture as usual and wound up with something that dried rock hard (lace points made of regular royal icing would break in an instant). Can anyone out there elaborate on this pastillage/gum paste liquification method? I'd like to try that for my gingerbread house this year; it looked so pretty on Deni's house.

Thanks for reading!