Happy Halloween!

Halloween seemed to arrive really quickly this year and we spent Friday carving our pumpkins.  

Although the kids "help" out, usually it's mommy and daddy doing most of the work.  This year, however, Eliana was big enough where she could do most of the cutting and scooping of seeds.

The pumpkin that Gabey picked out was smallish.  So it was easy to clean and carve.  He opted for a traditional jack-o-lantern face.

At first, he said he did not want the pumpkin's smile to have teeth.  Then, after Elvin was done cutting, he said he did want teeth.  Elvin had to add them after the fact, making them stay there using toothpicks.

 Karina tried valiantly to carve the face by herself.

 But her little hands got tired and Daddy had to take over.

And here are the finished products.  Karina's pumpkin has the assymetrical eyes--she thought that would make it look scarier.  Eliana's is the panda.  She mostly carved it all by herself (with a pattern!

 Here are the kids wearing their costumes.  This year, Eliana was a mermaid.  Karina was Elsa from the movie Frozen.  Xiao Yu was content wearing a doggie costume and Gabey was....himself.  As usual, he did not like putting on any costume.

We then started trick-or-treating.  It's our tradition that we always visit our next door neighbor's house first.  They have known our kids since they were born and enjoy seeing their costumes every year.

 We then drove over to a friend's house that was having a Halloween party.  There were LOTS of kids there and they went trick-or-treating as a large pack.  It was raining heavily so that's why you see the umbrellas.  But for these kids that have grown up in the Pacific Northwest, rain will NOT deter them from their share of candy.

 Here are the girls looking for the next house to visit...

In the end, the kids did not get a huge amount of candy, which is just fine by us.  Hope you guys had a good Halloween!