On Halloween we always avoid being home. Last year we decided to go shoe shopping at our local mall, and we found out that trick-or-treating at the mall is the "safe" alternative to trick-or-treating on the street.  It was overrun with little goblins and freaks, but since we were in the minority, as virtually the only non-tattooed, non-costumed family, we appeared to be the freaks...

So this year we decided we would do something different.  We took the kids on a Mystery Ride out to Lake Mohave for some star hunting.  Living in the dry, non-cloudy Southwest, we are in what would be a great area for stargazing IF Las Vegas would shut out the lights for once! Well, it was plenty dark for finding the major constellations, anyway.  We are new to the star map, so it was an education for us big people. AND, I might add, it was deemed a success when we found both the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper.

It was also a good opportunity to try out the "dark" settings on my digital camera:

Not quite dark enough for stars.

Where's the Big Dipper?

Piggy flashlight helps find stars. Oink Oink Oink.

Serious star student.

Happy star-gazers!

Actually, they are happy because they found something a lot more fun to do than craning their necks -- playing hide-and-seek in a very LARGE, very DARK parking lot, with only two flashlights (one being the dying piggy, oink oink), and DAD! One of the girls paid their daddy the highest compliment as we drove home: "None of those poor kids who went trick-or-treating had as much fun as WE did!  We got to play hide-and-seek with DAD!!" The "dad" sentiment was repeated several times tonight. Aren't dads great?!