Not since my kids grew out of it. I’m looking for a movie to go to tonight but there’s not much playing. I find it annoying that even though I have no decorations and the porch light is off the trick or treaters ring the doorbell and pound on the door anyway.
What I think of as our block – a horseshoe circuit with about 17 houses total – only has four houses with sub-college-age kids these days, seven of them in total, only three of whom are younger than 12. And one of them spends most of the time a few miles away with his mother. The lots are really big, and the houses set far back – in some cases really far back, like 500 feet – so it’s just not an efficient place to trick or treat. When our kids were young, there were lots of other kids on the block, and they all came by at some point during the evening, but as the kids aged they all figured out that they would get more candy if they went with friends in neighborhoods that were more dense.
The last 6-7 years, we have gotten 0-2 doorbell rings/year. I buy one bag of candy, and sometimes we never open it. We have gone out a few years, but generally we’re home.
We’ll probably celebrate Halloween by watching another episode of Stranger Things 2 and maybe listen to Dr. John’s “I Walk On Gilded Splinters” and Fairport Convention’s “Tam Lin.” My Halloween go-tos.
Our neighborhood gets a lot of new to the US trick or treaters which is fun. The kids often see me walking the dogs and are excited to come to “Sabadog and Sabapup’s house”! Sabadog has a lion’s mane “hat” that he will wear very briefly (he’s a yellow Lab) - Sabapup has a jingly collar and that’s about it. Our neighborhood is hilly and we have a big driveway - so we don’t get many kids but they are always very appreciative. I will have to pick up candy at lunch hour - if I bought it any earlier we all know who would be eating it!
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I'd give up just about any other holiday to keep Halloween. <<
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It has some nostalgic value but if it doesn’t give me a day off, it doesn’t even crack Top 10.
1 has to be Christmas. it has its own season. it takes over a month to celebrate it. Christmas rules.
2 - Thanksgiving. turkey, pumpkin pie, football, family, feasting, 4-day weekend, Fall dialed all the way up to 11.
3 - 4th of July
4 - Veterans Day b/c it's my anniversary.
New Years Eve/New Years Day, Good Friday/Easter, Memorial Day, Labor Day – days off, all good.
Super Bowl Sunday
OK, I guess Halloween barely cracks Top 10.
but we’ll still leave the lights off tonight.
I love Halloween!!! I used to go all out and decorate the house with hanging bodies, a graveyard, etc.- the whole works. I don’t really love all of the pre-purchased blow-up type decorations but prefer more homemade, campy stuff. This was even before we had kids and I continued after our kids were older. However, I tapered off the last 5 years or so because the number of kids coming around dropped drastically. I think that maybe because there were so many organized events, kids and parents chose to do those instead. Then for some reason, we got a zillion trick-or-treaters last year, on Monday of all things. Anyway, as a result, I am back to full on Halloween this year. Years ago, my brother set up a compresser to shoot a ghost out a box when the motion detector senses a warm body coming up to the door. It scares the heck out of the kids and they all love it.
We are on a street that gets a lot of traffic for Halloween. Hoards of people. It’s the kind of neighborhood that people from other neighborhoods will drive to, in order to trick or treat here.
I used to really like it. But about 10-12 years ago or so, I started to feel cranky and “get off of my lawn”-ish. When those feelings intensified, and I noticed I wasn’t having very much fun, I stopped participating.
We block the front porch with a ladder on it’s side, so people know not to trek up the driveway to the front door. Sometimes we’ll put up a paper that says “No Candy”, as I’ve seen some others do, but the ladder does the trick.
Absolutely. My kids loved it and looked forward to it every year. I would hate to deprive other kids of that joy.
A friend is in the midst of chemo, so my 14 year old will be manning the door at the friends house after school this afternoon, so she can rest and still see the kids in costume.
I’ve never been a Halloween “fan”… we took the kids around when they were young and once they were old enough to head out on their own, we stayed home and passed out candy. I’m pretty much over it now and leave the house until the “official” treat or treat time is over.
Because I’m dealing with lockjaw and on Valium 2xday so cant be driving around, H was in charge of buying the candy. He came home with about 20 big bags of candy when on a busy night the most we ever get is 10 kids. The real bummer is because I can’t eat anything that can’t be slurped I can’t even eat any of the candy. 
Bummed. Our town has postponed trick or treating due to the Nor’easter we just had. We won’t be around for the raincheck date. :(( =((
No, not since my S left his big dog with me about 6 years ago. He would be barking every time there was a knock on the door, and I used to worry that he would try to get out and accidentally hurt a kid. He seems to have mellowed lately, but we don’t have many (if any) kids in the neighborhood anyway. People used to “bus” their kids in from other parts of town, but now all the churches have a trunk-or-treat activity so most people go to those.
We don’t get a ton of trick-or-treaters here but gladly give out candy to those who come by. People in the neighborhood were always generous and kind to our kids when they went trick-or- treating and we are happy to be able to do the same for others.
We still do it–I expect we’ll have 15-20 kids total.
Each year I threaten to put out an empty basket with a sign that says “Please take only two.” But I never do it.
I decorated and we had relatives over to carve pumpkins. It was so fun. My mom has been asking for weeks, when will it be Halloween, so she can hand out candy at the door. The weather looks cold but dry, so we should have at least 50 kids.
W is going to be out with her girlfriends tonight so I’ll be home solo giving out candy. It’s a PITA but I couldn’t imagine turning off the lights and hiding out. Giving out candy just feels like one of those social-contract things you have to suck up and do in order to avoid that last step into curmudgeondom.
I do. Even when we get fewer kids and I end up eating all the left over candy, I still participate.
I love Halloween.
We’re in a funny little one block area separated from the main neighborhood by a busy street so we don’t get a lot of traffic, but a lot of young families have moved in. I would feel like a curmudgeon if I didn’t participate, and besides I like seeing the little cuties. I found the Halloween lights this morning and we have a pumpkin out. We’ll leave the door open. If there’s leftover candy dh takes it to the lab for the grad students to eat.
We’re on a hill, so only get the kids from the cul de sac and their friends (early, before they head down to the “flatland” part of the 'hood, where there will easily be about 1,000 kids). Tonight I won’t much mind the lack of T or T’ers, because of the World Series, and This is Us…
I wonder if anyone will make it down to our swamp tonight… kids want the 'hoods with the biggest candy density per acre. 
We are definitely not one of them.
I am out in the boonies. I haven’t had a trick-or-treater here, ever, in 25+ years. But I still buy candy, because it’s good to be prepared.