It's been a rough week with work and everything else going on in the world, so I didn't have time to post these earlier. Didn't want to disappoint you though and Meredith was asking, so here are the pics.

As you know, DH is really into DIY Halloween costumes and spends a ton of time planning and making his costume. And I like matchy matchy theme dressing, so I always go with whatever costume he's making and plan a family costume (though I am not crafty so I just buy the costumes for me & the kids). Some of our previous costumes are below (21-25) and recap of last year's samurai theme here: http://goldenpig.lookfab.com/p.....e-princess.

This year DH wanted to be a TIE fighter pilot and he has spent hours on a website called 501st Legion (http://www.501st.com) that details everything you need for your uniform to be up to spec to join Vader's army. Apparently there are cosplay folks (I mean soldiers) out there even more nerdy and hardcore than DH! He ordered the helmet and body armor months and months in advance (like March), but apparently it takes forever for them to be hand made and ship, sometimes over a year. He was promised that these things would arrive before Halloween, but when it looked like he wasn't going to get them in time, he scrambled started making his own. He was working on a cheap helmet from eBay and sanding and reshaping and painting it (16-17).Then the body armor never showed up so he created his own out of motorcycle gear, and was working on the chest piece box made of cardboard and tubing the night before Halloween (18). He even made a staff for Rey out of PVC pipe and bathroom fixtures (19-20) and painted my Leia gun (1). After all that, the official armor arrived Nov 1. I like the homemade version though!

So DH was a TIE fighter pilot, I was Princess Leia (the R2D2 purse came in handy!), 9 yo DD was Rey, 6 yo DS1 was Kylo Ren, and 3 yo DS2 was "Dark Bader". The girls were good and the boys were evil. Also the boys liked that they were the boss of DH. DH and I went to the kids' school parades in costume. It was raining that night, which cut the trick or treating a little short, but it was still fun.

Any suggestions for next year's theme? The kids are voting for Pokemon, but not sure DH is interested in making himself a Jigglypuff costume...

21. 2010 Space shuttle, astronauts and alien
22. 2012 Scuba diver (with bubble blower inside a papier mache tank), mermaids and Nemo
23. 2013 Astronauts, Buzz Lightyear and alien
24. 2014 The Incredibles (all store bought that year)
25. 2015 Samurai, Japanese princess and ninjas