Celebrating Halloween?

[unkachuck]

Already the neighbors have their Halloween decorations up. And some have quite elaborate decorations and hand-out treats in a costume. It wasn't long ago, Halloween was just Jack-o-Lanterns and Trick or Treat. Many today celebrate Halloween with the same decorative fervor of Christmas. How will you be celebrating Halloween?

[Lyric]

1. I take my kid trick-or-treating.

By the time we get home, the holiday's over and we just want to eat candy 'til we puke and then go to sleep.

:shrug:

[marybourg]

2. I live in an "active adult" community. Haven't seen a trick or treater

in 15 years.

[daleanime]

3. Ugh...

I work:cry:

[bigwillq]

4. I LOVE Halloween.

We don't really do decorations, like lawn ornaments or anything like that.

We do, however, get many pumpkins, and Indian Corn to hang on the garage. We give out candy. I would still go trick-or-treating, but I am normally working. Last time I went out was in 2004. I was John Kerry. Had a mask on. No one knew I was 27 years old. :)

[Skittles]

5. not really

will work 14 straight hours all night booting multiple mainframe systems - time changes that night

[rucky]

6. Best holiday of the year!

[dbonds]

7. I celebrate with the coven where we ritually visit our ancestors.

[Forkboy]

8. I eat a live human.

I really need to stop watching those zombie flicks....

[2Design]

9. I go and find places for adults to trick or treat and see decorations n/t

[proteus_lives]

10. Annual costume party with friends.

Always fun!

[VAliberal]

11. In defiance of the fundies in my community who are trying to kill

Halloween ~

I will have a makeshift graveyard in my front yard, zombies rising from their tombs, a smoke machine, appropriate accompaniment noises & kick ass high end candy.

Halloween for me, as a child, was full of wonder and mystery, the smell of burning candles inside slowly roasting pumpkins, falling leaves & the primal satisfaction of kicking and crunching through those fallen leaves; if one was lucky no rain and the full moon's light while trick-or-treating, the crisp chill of the air, feeling the turning of the seasons, Halloween movies on tv, Halloween songs sung at school....

I have tried to pass my experience of Halloween on to my children and I'll be damned if the right-wing 'Satan is everywhere' whack jobs are going to rob children of such simple joys.

[Arugula Latte]

25. Good post. I agree completely. I love Halloween for the same reasons you do.

I love your description of it, too. Thank you for fighting for the good guys in The War on Halloween. :patriot:

[rvablue]

31. Good for you! n/t

[ccharles000]

12. I buy candy for myself.

[Thickasabrick]

13. I do spend a lot for candy.....it's for the children......and me. nt

[Maru Kitteh]

14. We'll have some decorations, a nice fire going out on the patio and hand out candy

We buy our candy based on what kind of leftovers we would like to have. :evilgrin:

[chollybocker]

15. I voted for

"I don't participate. I lock the door, turn off the lights and pretend I'm not home."

But I do that everyday, so no biggee. ;)

[DoctorMyEyes]

24. LOL!

:toast:

[ZombieHorde]

16. "Other" Hand out cheap candy, do lots of crafts. nt

[seabeyond]

17. kids are only ones to wear costume, hubby has, he is a geek. lots of decoration. porch huge and

covered. webs... big spiders. hubby made a coffin and skeleton in it, tombstones. a couple tombstones that scream. 4, 5, 6, jack o lanterns and have to be the special carved, all the tools. massive production. oh and fogger. more times i have had to run after little ones as the go screamin down the sidewalk.

lots of candy

not a celebration though. it is a night of fun and play for hubby and kids (work for me) and family, together adn memories. been doing it so many years our house is the one to come to and neighbors come sit on the porch and we spend the evening chatting.

hubby never got to do this stuff growing up and now he makes us do all for all the holidays.

and i make everyone wait for decorations until after bday in oct.... only way to stop them from putting up in sept

[jwirr]

18. I voted but I lied. I stay home with the youngest great grandchildren

while Mom & Dad take the rest trick and treating. At home the kids dress in their outfits and help me give out candy to the people who come to our doors. I have just as much fun giving as the others do getting.

[Walk away]

19. I have been decorating the front of the house for three days...

Home made ghosts and scare crows, orange fairy lights in the bushes and trees. This year I am doing a life sized "Soul Food Cafe" in the back yard with ghost diners a skelaton wine steward and a pie with four and twenty blackbirds flying out of it. We are transforming our gazebo with cobwebs and purple, green and orange lights. The menu board will have dishes like "Stake Tartar", "I Scream Sunday" etc.

I even do a doggie graveyard in the secret garden and we invite the dogs in the neighborhood for a big party with donations for the local shelter!

Halloween is my Christmas!!!!

http://images2.snapfish.com/232323232%7Ffp53385%3Enu%3D3356%3E2%3A5%3E462%3EWSNRCG%3D323789%3C26%3B%3A7%3Bnu0mrj

[Arugula Latte]

20. We go trick or treating with a big, rowdy group of friends. The adults carry wine glasses.

It is Fun FUN FUNNNN!!! Gawd, I love Halloween. You can keep your Thanksgiving, keep your Xmas, keep your New Years, and shove your Easter down the bunny hole, but give me my Halloween. Candy, alcohol, costumes, paganism, harvesty overtones -- Who could ask for more out of a holiday? :bounce:

[nolabear]

27. We used to do that too! Trick-or-Drinking!

My sons are adults now but when they were little we'd all get together and haul them around in wagons, on bikes, in those little powered cars, etc. in our big cul-de-saccy neighborhood while the leaves blew all around and people tried to come up with more and more goofy decorations and costumes. It was just a blast.

[FreedomFlower]

21. I love dressing up.

The one time of the year when it's acceptable to wear a costume. Not so keen on handing out cavities to the youngins though.

[Luminous Animal]

22. I participate but do not hand out candy.

Explanation...

Halloween is my birthday.

[rvablue]

30. Can you explain further?

I don't get it.

Little kids can't get a mini candy bar because you're celebrating your B-day? :shrug:

[Luminous Animal]

35. Sure.

1) I celebrate because it is my birthday.
2) I don't hand out candy because very few children trick or treat in my neighborhood.

[Iggo]

23. I spend no money on decorations. All of it goes to candy.

I give out HUGE handfulls to ALL the kids, including the teenagers.

Halloween is the one night a year when I try to be "the cool house."

[Withywindle]

26. Other: Cheap decorations, cheap candy, elaborate costume.

In my building, in the early evening we sit out on the stoop in simple costumes - witch hat, vampire cape, that sort of thing - handing out candy to all the littles in the neighborhood.

Then we dress to the nines for the adult parties later on. I usually go to one at a local club where my friends' bands usually play. My upstairs neighbor's parties tend to the very long and Bacchanalian, which is usually fine with me. Except last year, when I had to get up at the crack of ass to go canvass for Obama in Indiana the next day, and they were still going at 4 AM. THat kind of sucked. I may or may not have yelled at some shrieking bimbo in a slutty nurse costume and beer hat that if McCain won by 50 votes in Indiana, it would be HER fault! :blush:

I'm going as The Raven this year. I have black feathered beaked mask, wings, feather boa for the neck-scruff, and a popcorn-cup full of plastic eyeballs. :D

[ezgoingrl]

28. Halloween is my absolute

favorite holiday of the year!!!!!

[bhcodem]

29. Trunk or Treat

I am on the Christian Outreach committee at my church (ELCA Lutheran) and this will be our third annual Trunk or Treat in the church parking lot for neighborhood children. I will be manning the church van handing out goody bags. Before that I lived on a heavy traffic street with no sidewalks, so never got any kids coming to my door.

[rvablue]

32. Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. And yet, I don't go ALL OUT

I carve a pumpkin and hand out decent but not expensive candy. Just the good, normal stuff from the grocery store.

I have such great memories of the holiday from when I was a kid, I can't for the life of me understand the "turn off the lights and pretend I'm not home" crowd. But, to each their own.

[cali]

33. other. a friend and I get a fire going under an old cauldron

and make spiced cider. We dress as crones and read scary stories and yeah we hand out candy. it's corny and old fashioned and low key, but the kids love it.

[Jokerman]

34. We will give out 175+ bags of microwave popcorn.

Our neighbors go all-out. Costumes, the whole yard turned into a haunted house complete with fog, lights and music.

Car loads of kids in costumes come from miles around and most of them hit us up as well.

Most of the kids like the popcorn and we've had several parents thank us for giving out something other than candy.