Happy Halloween!

We just finished up a nice Halloween evening, and the kids are finally in bed after staying up late in a (likely unsuccessful) attempt to get them to sleep in to at least the regular wake-up time tomorrow after we "fall back" tonight.

Charlie has wanted to be a hockey player for two years now, so this year I was able to find a uniform--Edmonton Oilers, the only choice--and that's what he was. Cort supplemented my uniform purchase with some cool gloves and a hockey stick, and Charlie got a lot of oohs and ahs from the guys at the Halloween party we went to this afternoon. He looked pretty cool, I have to say.

Joe decided he wanted to be a boxer, and he looked great too. He had the boxing gloves, the headgear, and even the taped up shoes. We thought he was going to be a scrawny boxer, but once he got dressed up he looked pretty authentic. Definitely a featherweight, but authentic.

And since I was afraid this might be the last year that I could dictate Will and Helen's costumes, I did so. And they were A B S O L U T E L Y A D O R A B L E as . . .

Raggedy Ann and Andy!! They really were cute, and except for some initial reluctance on the part of Raggedy Andy, they both loved the costumes and the entire evening.

We did only a little bit of trick-or-treating--a visit to both the boys' teachers and then a trip around the block. After that, we hung out on our front porch and handed out candy. Honestly, everyone enjoys that just as much, if not more. Charlie was our official candy-hander-outer, along with Uncle Rick (who came in town for the weekend, and we loved seeing him!). Joseph was our official people spotter (he would alert us whether it was one person or a group, and if they were scary) and candy-bowl-filler-upper. Will and Helen were mostly our official candy eaters, but if the stream of trick-or-treaters waned, they would both ask for "More people! More people!!" By 9pm we had handed out all of the candy we had bought and most of the candy the kids had collected, so we called it a night.

Hope everyone else had a great Halloween too!

The aforementioned "initial reluctance" on the part of Raggedy Andy

Helen and Joe trick-or-treating at a neighbor's house

The Maddux kiddos doing the neighborhood

Helen enjoying some of her loot

Charlie handing out goodies

Will and Helen enjoyed themselves and the candy

The successful evening can be seen on his face!