Happy
Halloween!
Halloween
has always been one of my favorite holidays.
It allows me to express my creative side—often to the max—by dressing up
in all sorts of whacky costumes, many of which I design and make myself. And then there’s the whole getting and giving
candy part of the holiday. Some people
are fond of cream puffs, eclairs and the like.
Me, I’m a pushover for candy—always have been. The other great part about Halloween was how
we, as kids, got to stay out past dark, going door-to-door, hoping for
treats. As a child, I especially enjoyed
getting to have everyone see my costume when I’d knock on his or her door. As an adult, I’ve appreciated viewing those
who come dressed to my door.
While
my kids were growing up, I began a Halloween tradition that was a huge
hit. On that night, I’d have a party—a
potluck, where I’d provide the main dish, asking that others bring simple side
dishes or desserts. Seeing as everyone,
like me, was busy trying to get their kids ready to head out, folks liked the
idea of getting together to at least eat.
Some would stay at our house socializing while other adults would take
the kids out trick-or-treating. Some,
their children grown, would simply come for the camaraderie and a warm meal
enjoyed with friends.
There
were always last-minute costume adjustments prior to the kids heading out. But being able to do so surrounded by friends
doing the same seemed to take some of the stress out of the task. For those kids who opted not to go
door-to-door, I had games available for them to play, such as bob for apples
and the like. And for the adults who
opted to relax at our house rather than head out and brave the hoards of people
that come to our neighborhood, we’d have a movie playing for their enjoyment.
As
my kids grew into teens, I continued hosting my Halloween night parties, going
to great lengths to transform the inside of our house into a haunted
mansion. This pleased the teens who
often opted to only go trick-or-treating for a short time so they could then
return to our house for fun, games, movies and munching on their collected
candy.
As
I mentioned, our neighborhood gets a good amount of visitors on Halloween. And being lovers of the Holiday, my family
and I decided to make ours one of the main destination points for
visitors. We’d transform our entire
front yard into a cemetery, covering it with an endless array of tombstones,
many of which we’d created ourselves.
From the nine trees we have out front, we’d hang a large variety of
ghosts and skeletons, creepy enough looking during the day. But at night, when we’d shine eerie greenish
lights on them, they rose to a whole new level of disturbing. To the limbs of the trees, we attached huge
fake ravens to make it look as if they were overseeing the cemetery…waiting for
more corpses to arrive. And we strung
endless lengths of cobwebs here, there and everywhere.
To
complete our scary cemetery, we ran fog machines—at least three of them. And then came the fun part. When our kids began getting older, one of
their favorite Halloween pastimes with their friends was to lay out in our
cemetery, dressed all in black or in creepy ghoulish costumes. They’d wait for unsuspecting visitors to come
and get their treats from us. Then, as
the trick-or-treaters made their way back up our winding front pathway, our
kids and their friends would jump up and scare them.
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