the avengers assemble on halloween

**Please excuse my constant lateness of posting.  I realize it is January and I am posting something from October.  I am pretty sure I did the same thing last year.  My computer is acting crazy and freezing up a lot, but even without that issue, November thru December get so crazy for us.  I have a lot of catch up to do.  I mean is anyone really reading this anymore?

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This year's Halloween theme was The Avengers.  The big decision went through many transitions in my family.  Gus had been wanting to be Hercules for quite awhile, but then somehow got his heart set on Batman since we already have the costume.  There had been talk of our whole family doing DC comic characters, but Jimmy really didn't want to.  He had a few different ideas, but once he heard his cousins were doing Avengers, he really wanted to be part of the group.   Just being a superhero was not enough, he wanted to be an Avenger even if it meant being one he had never heard of.  After playing with his cousin's Falcon action figure for a few hours, he decided Falcon was pretty cool and he wanted to be him.  I thought Gus might really want to be part of the group when the time came, too.  I told him he could dress up in his Batman costume for his birthday and be Iron Man for Halloween.  When he saw an Iron Man costume at Costco, he was sold.  He was so excited and told me it was, "his coolest costume ever."  Seeing as I have made all his other ones myself, I thought that was pretty rude, but I let it slide.  After quite a debacle Nora ended up with two costumes.  I had wanted her to be Wonder Woman when we were maybe all going to do the DC thing.  Since Zach and I were still planning on being Clarke Kent and Lois Lane, I thought she would be the cutest little Wonder Woman.  My sister was really trying to get me to have her be Miss Marvel from the Avengers so she could be part of the group, but I didn't really think anyone would know who she was and she wears a mask that I knew Nora wouldn't keep on.  I  had ordered a Wonder Woman onesie weeks before our pre-Halloween photo shoot, but it still hadn't come in the mail so I started to panic.  I had already been contemplating how to have her costume double as Miss Marvel, but with no Wonder Woman costume, I was suddenly forced to get creative.  A good friend happened to have the perfect onesie to borrow and she helped me whip up a Miss Marvel costume the day of.   She ended up looking adorable even if she is obscure.  Okay, so that is all the boring details about how much thought goes into this craziness.  Now for the fun part...

Always hard to get all the kids looking appropriate at the same time, but they are cute no matter what.

And now for the full character run-down:

Jack was Tony Stark turning into Iron Man (his glove and chest all really lit up which was very cool):

 Gus was the full Iron Man (and he thought his glow-in-the-dark hands and chest were pretty cool, too):

Lily was Captain America:

Finn was Hawkeye:

Dot was Black Widow:

(I think that is her Scarlett Johansson pout-face.  Always the actress this one.)

Kateri was Wasp:

Nora was Miss Marvel:

Jimmy was Falcon:

Lucy and Audry were Thor and Loki and managed to hold up their long tradition of going as siblings:

Pretty impressive helmets right?  

(On a side note, what is the deal with Thor in the movie never wearing the helmet?)

They did some re-enactment poses of them attacking Loki which were pretty funny....

Gus wanted to get in on the pretending to fly action too...

They were good sports about all the pictures for awhile and then Miss Marvel told us she was done and walked away to get food.

So did the Hulk...

But, of course, on real Halloween we made them take lots of pictures again...

Nora's Wonder Woman onesie finally came in the mail so I couldn't resist breaking away from the theme.  I mean, this is too cute not to get some use out of right?...

Me and my Superheroes:

As usual Zach is a good sport and does whatever I tell him...

Mimi and Johnny always love coming to join in the fun.

The kids had a great time Trick-or-Treating...

As usual they loved visiting the "Haunted House."

One of the best parts, of course, is coming home to check out the loot.

And then very carefully organize it if you are one of these crazy kids....

Dot brought out costumes from Halloweens past and kept taking turns having Nora wear the one she wasn't currently wearing.  Both Rapunzel and Alice made appearances...

Gus thought the Iron Man Pumpkin was made just for him...

Another Halloween come and gone.
How will we ever compete with ourselves?
I am sure we will try.  We are crazy like that.