Remember when Halloween Was Fun?
 

Remember when Halloween was more about fun than about grossing people out? There are two houses in my neighborhood that seem to try and out do each other every year in who can be the grossest and most disturbing. Whatever happened to Jack-O-Lanterns, ghosts and witches? Now it's...well I won't go into detail because some of the stuff is disturbing. What do you think?

Oh yeah, I agree it use to be a lot different. Different in that my Mom would make pans of Rice Krispies treat, cut into squares and wrapped in wax paper to hand out. Long gone times now.

I will never forget the year one of my friends had a party instead of trick or treating. I felt so deprived and vowed never again!
My brother used to go out and get tons more candy than my sister and me. I remember that too haha

We went to a Catholic school so we always had the next day off as it was All Saints Day. My parents would let me have a friend overnight and that was fun. We'd go out together in my neighborhood for trick or treat.

Our neighborhood is pretty much the same as I remember growing up as far as Halloween goes.

I lived in town until age 11 or so and we were set loose at dark and didn't come home until the last house light went off. All the kids were out and the few adults out were pushing strollers. The older kids had to take the younger siblings and be responsible for them. We moved rural and houses were far apart so not much trick or treating but we had hay rides and big bon fires.

I remember waiting for it to get dark so we could go out! It was so much fun. Just the kids and a scattering of adults who usually stood around talking while we went house to house. One of my neighbors always dressed up as a witch and decorated her house. To get one of her awesome homemade candied apples, you had to walk down her scary front hall and she was sitting there dressed as a witch with a smouldering cauldron. It was scary for a 5 year old, but so much fun!

In my neighborhood now the kids come around in the back of pickup trucks or with their parents in golf carts. A few years ago, I had two parents yelling at each other across the street in front of my house. When got out of their trucks and started into the street like they were going to get in a fight, I turned off the lights and locked the doors. No wonder kids don't know how to behave!

Halloween is still fun. It’s different now for some but I don’t think we get to tell others what’s fun and what isn’t. The world keeps changing. In my experience the good old days weren’t what they are cracked up to be.

I have 6 grandkids. They are all over the place with their costume; some cute, some funny, some gross. They are all having fun.

True Janie, but we are still allowed to say what was fun for us. And, frankly, the kids today sure don't look like they are having as much fun as we had. They can't have the freedom we had with IMO allowed us to grow and be independent. Of course, they good old days weren't what everyone says, but neither is today

It was so very different back in my day. Rarely was a house decorated as they are now and money was spent on candy. The occasional candy apple or other home made treats were the best!

Absolutely, Patrice we are allowed to say what was fun for us. That was my point. When I read that something “used to be fun” it suggests that it no longer is. What’s fun or not is subjective. The things we did for Halloween when I was a kid made my grandmother shake her head. ‘‘Twas ever thus.

We lived "out in the country" - so we never did anything like trick or treating for Halloween.

I think we did get to do some "art projects" that might have been Halloween-ish in school.

ummm....I was scared of Halloween back in the day....I had watched the "Wizard of Oz" and I knew all about those bad witches and their flying monkeys! Also, living in northern Minnesota, we were out trick or treating in the snow more than once. I do remember however, we used to get regular sized candy bars....not the tiny ones used now a days. I will not be handing out candy this year because of Covid rates being high were I am and also because of no sidewalks were I am and folks speeding even during treat or treat time. Just scares me too much! I will probably watch "Anaconda" or "Arachnophobia" or...maybe just The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" or maybe the "Alien Series"...oh my, I getting scared already!

I lived in a suburb of NYC, about 40 minutes onto Long Island. Our mom would drop us off a few miles from home. we'd do all the rich houses first. the houses were close together so it was easy to fill a bag. As it would get close to dinner, we'd go to the deli, donut shop, beer distributor, and get a finger sandwich, donut and rootbeer. Eventually, we'd make our way back to our neighborhood. We lived a block from the main road thru Long Island. We'd hit the bars about 8 pm. We'd get quarters from everyone. sometimes, only a dime, but there were about 10 bars in a few blocks, and the money piled up quickly. Food places were good for treats. we'd go to one deli about 5-6. Remember the Hostess fruit pies? they were handheld, with fruit inside, and s rich sugar glaze on them. The fish market would give out small bags of their frenchfries. so good. those were the days.

I do remember the year we all collected for UNICEF. Honestly, I was so young that I don't think I really understood what it was all about and I'm a little embarrassed to admit I was a little disappointed to not get candy! :)

My favorite Halloween as a grown up: The sun is almost down. It is a golden twilight. One neighbor has a bonfire in their front yard. Two kids from the marching band are playing their saxophones somewhere. I can hear but not see them. The youngest trick or treaters are making the rounds with their parents lagging behind. Felt like a movie set.

Houses in my neighborhood were rarely decorated beyond a pumpkin on the porch. One woman made the very best candy apples. We always went to her house first even if we had to stand in line We wanted to be sure that we got one!

When I went to parochial school they’d have an event at the church to deter us from trick or treating. I would still trick or treat afterwards. Anyway, we have a couple grosser setups in our neighborhood. Most people have tamer decorations. We keep ours more fun as there are lots of little ones living in our neighborhood.

When my youngest son was in Boy Scouts (age 11 to 18), he participated in building a haunted house every year. It. Was. So. Awesome! There is a scoutmaster in my neighborhood who turns his entire garage and driveway into a haunted house. He invites a handful of scouts to help: they are responsible for coming up with the concept/theme, then they design it, build all the sets and mazes, program it for light and sound, decorate it, and then on Halloween night they get to be the actors in it. They work on it the entire month of October. The scouts learn basic construction techniques, leadership, working together as a team, and they have the ability to earn their theater merit badge. They usually got 300 to 400 people from the community (it was free to attend) going through every year (pre-Covid). After the haunt closes, the scoutmaster's wife has a giant spaghetti feed prepared, with salad & garlic bread for all the scouts. Everyone takes turns telling their best story about their best scare. My son loved, loved, LOVED it.
I loved it because I felt that by age 13-15, they had kind of outgrown dressing up in costumes and going around asking for candy. It seemed like they'd put the minimum amount of effort into their costumes and were only doing it just to get the candy. The haunted house gave them something more challenging, fun, and age appropriate to do for the entire month.

I've found it really interesting to watch how decorating has changed in my lifetime. My brother and I started decorating our house for Halloween in the late 70s. We would make a scarecrow each year (stuffed with used computer paper - the really wide stuff where each sheet was connected to the next and folded z-style - that my father brought home from work), and would arrange some fake spiders, bugs and one rubber snake inside the front door near where we kept the candy bowl. One of the rubber spiders had a suction cup for attaching to a wall, so I would tape a thread to its back that ran up to the middle of the doorway and then lightly use the suction cup to attach to the the door frame. After a few minutes, the suction cup would let go and the spider would swing on the thread. It was very fun when this would happen when their were trick-or-treaters picking out their candy, and the sudden movement from the spider would make them really jump! At that point, at least in our town, in seemed the only houses that had somewhat scary decorations, were being done by kids and with homemade decorations, such as cob webs made of polyfill. I remember one house having a cassette player outside with scary noises playing, obviously made by children.

As the 80s and 90s progressed, there started to be commercially available decorations - I remember when the webs for decorating bushes became popular. I get still get I kick out of the homemade decorations. When my daughter was little, I made a "Mr. Bottle Bones" skeleton from milk jugs. She loved that skeleton and would drag him all over the house for weeks. We still hang him in the trees to flutter in the late October breezes.

There used to be a house in town that decorated for every holiday, but Halloween was the biggest display. They added something new every year. I was very impressed with a vertical coffin that had a skeleton head and chest rise up to come into view of the open portion of the coffin, and then sink back down. My family was very sad when we saw that house was for sale, as that was the end of fabulous displays there.

I still enjoy Halloween - I’m 74 and I try to dress up every year. This year I’ll be wearing my pig outfit with silver wings (when pigs fly!!!!j and I’ve added a nice furry pink snout and ears. I do miss being able to hand out hime-made treats though. People have wrecked the treats because they just want to harm kids! Our neighbor used to have spooky music and a very weird hand that would reach the treats through the door. Some years he would have us inside for hot chocolate. My last year of trick or treating was 1964 when I was 17 and wore a cat costume complete with ears and tail (thanks to my friend next door who took dance lessons and loaned me her outfit). I made costumes for my son every year till he was around 10 (he’s now 41) and I’ve kept all of them! But Halloween is still fun as I really enjoy seeing all the kids and their costumes.

Sandy in Mooresville, NC

Speaking of decorations, when I was coming home last night I noticed my neighbors had put two big inflatable black cats in their yard. They were almost as tall as the house! So cute!

My sons (11 and 9 at the time) made a huge haul during the Halloween Blizzard of 1991 here in Minnesota! They were even featured on local TV stations. My DH shoveled a path, and they trudged up and down the block. They were the only kids out, and people gave them tons of candy. The reporter and camera crew happened to see them, and followed them around.