Last night I drove twenty-eight miles in one and a half hours so Princess and Pink Panther could trick-or-treat at 13 houses and get loads of artificially colored and flavored junk that I don't want them to eat. Meanwhile, my husband stayed home so he could give candy to the one family who told me earlier in the day they would be coming. The reality of living in the country is that Halloween doesn't turn out to be the Halloween of books, movies, and television where a group of children or parents and children traipse around a neighborhood screeching trick-or-treat and laughing. Instead, the children are in and out of the car a dozen times at houses whose owners know to expect us. We went to one of Princess' friend's house and when the father, one of my childhood friends, answered the door he was truly excited. He said he had never had a trick-or-treater before.
When I was a child things were about the same so Halloween rituals are not exactly a shock. The children accept this method of madness and think it is grand. More candy comes from those you know and see daily. But, I've always wanted the Halloween of my mind's eye. It may not exist, in reality, but a little less driving and a little less in and out would be fantastic. Homemade treats and a carnival would be a nice touch! I want a steady stream of trick-or-treaters. We always have really great treats!!!
I did get the ultimate Halloween treat - a new neice!! My younger sister had a baby yesterday. I will see her today. But, now I have to go dip into those treats!
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7 comments:
Funny you should blog about this. For year one of my best friends always ventured the forty minutes to our neighborhood for Halloween, as they too lived on a farm.
In years past, our neighborhood was your mind's vision: a friendly evening of visiting with neighbors, folks pulling tots in wagons. Whole families were out on porches, oohing and aahing over the costumes, and asking the kids for tricks. One family took it to the hilt, and turned their property into a haunted tour for the night, complete with eerie music blaraing and smoke machines. They staged human victims, buried folks with talking heads in front of gravestones, and even had Jason coming out of the woods with his chainsaw (motor only, no chain). It was amazing, even for we adults. Halloween hasn't been the same since they moved!
In 22 years, I've never had a trick-or-treater, but then again, it's only 7 miles to "civilization". My girls always loved to trick or treat, but my sensitive Jacob was scared by a guy with a live boa constrictor wrapped around himself the very first year I took them (and the very first house too!), and he never went again. He was happy to stay at a friend's house and pass out candy. Isn't that sad? 16 years old and he's never trick or treated.
Mother Crone, Your neighborhood sounds spookilicious!! If I had a haunted party, maybe I could get some people to come to my house.
Doc, Sad, maybe for the lost opportunity, but passing out candy is almost as much fun as trick-or-treating and it's never too late to don a costume. Buy one for him next year.
A Halloween birthday, how fun! Congrats to the whole family!
We've never had trick or treaters at our house either, so we buy the good stuff -- in case some does come -- so we can eat it ourselves after -- when no-one does lol.
When the kids were little we would go to the neighbors, but they'd end up feeding us supper and the kids would get antsy. One of the neighbors prepares a virtual lunchbox for each child, with juice box, cheese stick, yogurt, granola bars, etc. lol.
We usually drive to town to go trick or treating with friends -- half the fun is seeing the decorated houses. But this year we were invited to friends' for their "haunted house" party complete with dinner, which was wonderful. And ever so much cozier than trick or treating in the dark and cold (and it was around 20F and windy...).
I'm convinced. Next year we will host a halloween party. I'm so excited!!!
Congratuations on the new little goblin in the family -- the best treat of all!
It's common practice in our county for the rural dwellers to carpool (to my neck of the woods) for trick-or-treating. Even my dentist, who lives twenty miles or so into the county brings his kids to my neighborhood. Yet, since our house set back on a private drive with only one other house, we're lucky to greet one group of goblins, if anyone stops by at all!
This year Myrtle organized a party at her dad's house -- a dozen of her little sisters' friends from school, bobbing for apples, limbo, pizza, and then a trek around Dad's neighborhood (even more houses than mine), and everyone went home happy.
As cute as the kids' costumes are, Halloween is never going to be my favorite holiday. I'm the mom who put granola and carrot sticks in their Easter baskets when they were to young to know about Jelly Beans and Peeps. And the granola was made from scratch :-)
My current Thanksgiving task is finding a passable pie crust recipe using spelt. Any ideas? (I know, I should just give it up!)
Filling up on all that really disgusting food is a huge turn off. I am guilty too! I will pop candy into my mouth until I feel truly gross. I feel that way now, almost a week after the day.
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