Hangin' with the Haacks: A Super Halloween

We've had a busy week, so we had to pack all of our Halloween-related activities into today. That included carving pumpkins after school today! (This is Jeff's least favorite part of the holiday.) Samantha begged me to roast the pumpkin seeds, so we separated them out from the goop. I've never roasted them before (well, Jeff insists that I tried once and that they were horrible), so this will be an experiment.

Christian carved his pumpkin all by himself - including scooping the goop

Alex enjoyed designing her pumpkin with a Sharpie. Samantha thought this was a terrible idea.

Daddy scooped out Samantha's goop, as she was more interested in separating seeds. She did her own design & carving, though!

Alex's 3-eyed pumpkin

After clean-up and a quick dinner, the kids changed into their costumes. Christian was Superman, and Samantha & Alexandra were both Supergirl. We had a hard time picking costumes this year. Christian really wanted to be Wolverine, but I couldn't find it for cheaper than $65, and I refused to spend that much on a children's costume. Alex wanted to be a kitty cat, but I couldn't find one in her size. Samantha wanted to be everything she saw. In the end, they decided that a theme would be fun, and they all agreed on Superman/girl. (The girls were on board because their costumes were pink and shiny!)

Jeff took all three kids out trick-or-treating, while I stayed home to hand out candy. Well, they all started out together, anyway! About 10 minutes after they left, I was surprised to find Christian at the door with a group of trick-or-treaters! He had found a group of his friends, accompanied by one boy's older brother as chaperone, and ditched his dad. ("It's embarrassing to go trick-or treating with my dad!") About 20 minutes after that, Jeff and Alex came home without Samantha. She, too, had found a group of her friends (with one of their moms) and ran off. They're growing up way too fast! I'm sure I didn't go trick-or-treating with friends until I was in junior high, and borderline too old to go anymore! But we didn't want to take away their fun, and they were safe, so why not... Jeff did get a chance to go back out with Christian, after he outlasted his friends. They thought the townhouses near us were funny, as they were mostly retired people who handed out Werther's. Hey, I like Werther's, so I'll eat 'em! Oh, and the fire department came down our street, lights on and horn blaring... it was startling, but it turned out they were handing out candy! The kids thought that was a hoot! My camera battery had died by that point, so no pictures of that.