Halloween 2017

Ever since Emma’s first Halloween when she was 10 months old, I have had themed costumes.  First it was Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm, then Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf.  Next came Batman, Robin & the Riddler, followed by Jake, Izzy, & Cubby (Jake and the Neverland Pirates), then Wizard of Oz (Dorothy, Tin Man, Munchkin, & Glinda), then Star Wars (Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, Leia, & R2D2), then another Star Wars (Kylo Ren, Rey, Darth Vader, & Leia).  Whew, I’m tired – are you? Anyways, I knew the day would come when they all had a mind of their own and wanted to be something different.  I’ve braced for that the last few years, but with so many Star Wars fans in our family, it wasn’t hard to stick to that theme.  At least 3 out of 4 wanted a Star Wars costume, so all it took was a little convincing of that 4th child to play along.  Fortunately, it wasn’t that hard.

Well, this year we break that trend.  Emma really wanted to be Wonder Woman, inspired by Jessie Graff from American Ninja Warrior (although she made it very clear her shirt would cover her belly 🙂 ).  Honestly, I couldn’t argue with that. She wants to be strong and compete on ANW just like Jessie, and Wonder Woman helps her do that.  More power to ya, sister.  So with a Wonder Woman, I knew the costumes would be disjointed, so I embraced that and convinced Ellie to be Pippi Longstocking, a dream of mine for her ever since we knew her hair was red.  Her hair is finally long enough to pull off the crazy braids, and after watching the movie together as a family, she was hooked.  My favorite part of her is hearing her say “Mr. Nilsson LOVES bananas!”  Watch the movie, and you’ll know what I mean 🙂  Luke wanted to be Superman (frankly, I could convince him to be ANY superhero – this is his life right now!).  Since I don’t have a Superman costume, but had all the necessary items for Clark Kent, I did a little coaxing and convinced him to be Superman’s secret identity, which he loves.  I put together all items I had (minus the glasses – thank you, Amazon!) and VOILA! We have Clark Kent!  (Never mind he looks more like Ralphie from the Christmas Story – hmmm, another idea for another year??).  Then there’s Seth – the always faithful Star Wars costumer.  Grandma had bought him the Chewy costume/PJs and mask (yes, it is the talking mask and it’s hilarious) for his birthday last year, so when he told me he wanted to be Chewy, I was like “DONE!”  I used to be so in to making the costumes, but the older they get, and the more complicated, I’m ok with letting that go.  The only thing I made this year was Pippi’s apron (don’t look too closely), and Wonder Woman’s crown and cuffs.

I am absolutely in love with their costumes this year.  Each child has fully embraced their character, which makes it all the more fun.  And why the photoshoot, you might ask?  This has become a (non-planned) tradition in our home.  In fact, one of them asked me when we’d be taking the pictures, and then when I actually decided to do them, I simply said, “Let’s get our costumes on!” and they knew exactly what was happening.  It’s just a fun time to take pictures, letting them show us who they are at this age.  Each kids’ personality shines, even more so than other times I take their pictures, and that’s just not something I want to miss!  So yes, each year, you better believe we’ll be doing this shoot.

I asked Luke to give me a Superman pose.  I got a Dab instead.