What do y'all do on Halloween? Curious minds............ Mine is turning out to be a lot busier than usual, which is typically hanging at the house giving out Halloween candy while Paige and William take the kids trick or treating in the neighborhood. There's the Halloween Dance Party at my studio on Friday night, which I normally don't dress up for, but I will this time, because there's something else going on that I also need a costume for. I'm going as My Little Pony. Don't laugh. Basically I found a MLP tee shirt, and realized that with a few additions of things to it (which I already have in my closet) I could dress it up enough to get away with that as a costume....and keep in mind that I have to be able to DANCE in the damn thing, which is what makes choosing one so difficult. But that tee shirt, plus my tutu from the Color Run 5K's that I do, plus some yellow leggings, some beads, bright earrings and a MLP headband that I found at the dollar store, and I'll be good to go.....oh, and some neon yellow and green in my hair. I'll be totally comfortable and able to dance up a storm. Early Saturday I'll meet with Ned's brother and wife for a quick breakfast with them as they pass through town from Michigan on their way to their other home in Florida. The other reason for the costume is because Saturday before Halloween eve I'm going to a Halloween Baby Shower.....one of my "adopted" sons Terry (Paige's ex-boyfriend) and his wife Corina are expecting their first child next Feb...Paige's birthday in fact. Terry's favorite seasonal thing is Halloween, so of COURSE he had to have the shower early in order to make all his guests dress in costume!! I'll get home from that just in time to put the food on for a kinfolk get together here....my boys, Ned, Chris (another of my "adopted" kids) and his GF Shannon, my son Cameron's new GF Sarah. Cam and Sarah apparently are coming in costume, which will make me feel a little bit less conspicuous because I'll still be in my costume from the baby shower I'll make a big pot of beef barley soup, bake some bread, we'll all hang and eat, then Paige &William will take off for half an hour to take the kids round the neighborhood while the rest of us hang.....IF they can find a break in the weather. It's supposed to be quite cold (was last year too) and rainy...and the rainy is the potential problem. I'll return to my normally scheduled programming for Sunday...which is grocery shopping for the family, finish up the laundry, other household stuff to get ready for the new week. Whew....busy weekend!! You?
Not so much here. Most people we know do not celebrate Halloween, for the obvious reason but we have the house decorated on the inside at least for us. We usually stay home on the night because most of our neighbors come from a culture where setting off fireworks is part of the celebration and in the drought that can be a stupid thing to do but they do it anyway....so we stay home just in case. We do not wait for the Trick or Treaters, my entire front yard is a garden and I don't want anything to encourage them to come running through the garden to get to the front door. So Randy and I stay home with the lights off, watching our favorite Halloween movies.....none of which involve Zombies or Vampires. It's usually a Miyazaki animated movie called Kiki's Delivery Service and the movie Practical Magic. And since it is on Saturday this year, Svengoolie is showing the original Frankenstein at 9 p.m. that night...but we will most likely watch Young Frankenstein instead, it's much funnier.
I love Halloween so the outside of the house is decorated a little. This year our daughter and 15 year old granddaughter is with us and my GD LOVES Halloween! She loves to dress up as scary as possible and decided this year to set up her own 'spook house' and I mean spooky! Grandpa is going to help her set in up in part of the garage. I had her make two signs, one saying 'good witch' to point to the front door for the little kids that may get scared and the other says 'bad witch' pointing to the garage. I'll post a picture of her homemade costume later today. It's SCARY!
One year my brother and his friend set up a coffin in our garage. He laid down all made up to be a long dead body and his friend was hidden behind the garbage can. He would tell my brother when older kids were coming so he could turn on the black light, sit up and scare the beegeebers out of them and tell him NO when little ones were heading to the door then the light stayed off so as not to scare them. And then there was the year my Mom put a carved pumpkin on the windowsill in my bedroom with a candle in it and the candle caught the curtains on fire. I was always the one who answered the door and passed out the candy but that year a complete stranger scared me half to death when he busted into the house, ran around the corner and kicked the window out, his friend was out there with a hose to put the fire out.
We put a carved pumpkin outside the door, hang some plastic bats and wait. I usually dress up, put some horrible make-up on and throw the door open while I cackle as witchy as I can. The neighbourhood children love me! My carved pumpkin this year is a mess, but I'll put it outside anyways.
We don't decorate for Halloween, neither inside nor out. We don't have trick-or-treaters since they object to walking a half-mile between houses! I do bake pumpkin nut bread, and pumpkin cookies and take them into town for some of the shops' staff, and those residents of the nursing home that can have sweet things. (I have to confess to buying a small bag of Reese's Pieces--just in case we have trick-or-treaters, and then eating it myself over the first week in November which arrives about 7 p.m. on Oct. 31.)
I object very very strongly to people encouraging their children to go round to people's house demanding with menaces. If I did it, then I would be arrested and put on trial/ Teaching children Devil worship is totally wrong too!
lol - Well our Halloween is strictly about fun around here. We decorate and really enjoy seeing the kiddos come by in their costumes. We have lived here and kept this tradition for long enough that by now, each year there are parents bringing by their own little ones, who reminisce to us how they recall coming by when THEY were little - oooh , that makes me feel my age!
The origin of Halloween is Christian with an influence from a Celtic harvest festival. Pope Gregory IV (795-844) set All Saints' Day on November 1st. to commemorate all saints without their own day and all Christian martyrs. We also have All Souls' Day on November 2d. This day is dedicated to praying for the departed souls. On All Hallow's Eve (Halloween) there should be a vigil. This three-day festival is the Allhallowtide.
Our list of trick or treater's as we call them is getting shorter every year..it sure didn't help that it was a little damp but at least the heavy rain had stopped. We only had 6 children...not sure if I will bother next year or not...if we have some place to go we will leave the candy on the porch for them. We had the cutest group that came to the door, the parents dressed up too. My husband had put the candy in one an old pyrex wedding present bowl (47 years old) and it was heavy to lift full of candy bars. I held it in front of a little girl and she just dug her little hands into the bowl...grabbing as many as she could. I almost dropped the bowl. Then the other ones started in. They were so darn cute and dressed up so great, all I did was smile and let them dig. Halloween used to be my favorite time of the year but more people are taking children in town where houses are closer and they don't have to walk so far for a treat....
We had 22 children visiting this year, a few more than last year. They were all cute and adorable, and they all said thank you. I managed to give them all a fright, so I think I'll call our Halloween evening a success.
Droopy...we used to put on masks and get all made up for Halloween but with the number of children dropping every year, we have lost our Halloween spirit....to be on the safe side, if I had young children again, I would play games and let them win candy instead of letting them go out. It seems like something bad usually happens some place in the world and it scares people. It is even dangerous in some places to open the door to strangers with all of the things happening in the world.
Halloween is a time for the kids to pretend..... But there are always adults who want to spoil the fun.
