Ever since I was a kid, I've loved Halloween. As a child I was a Saturday afternoon monster movie devotee, subscriber to Universal's movie monsters magazine, and used to run home from school at three p.m. to catch the final fifteen minutes of the 'vampire/werewolve/witch' daytime soap, Dark Shadows. My first fledgling stories were scary, bonechiller tales--or so I thought at the time. It's hard to read those stories now without erupting into howls more akin to the comedic than the fearful. (Well, except fear that these rather pitiful attempts at 'Poe-like prose'will ever be seen by another human being.)
My brother was a Frankenstein fan. My sister usually did the 'vamp' thing. So the only real monster left for me was the Wolfman. Man, I hated those slobbery fake wolf teeth...
Haunted houses and corn mazes were also big. I remember one particular haunted house our church youth group visited and I seem to recall my big, tough, older, jockette sister was leading our group through a rather tight crawlspace which we had to negotiate on our hands and knees one at a time and she suddenly stopped dead in her tracks (pun carefully chosen) and refused to go one doggy step further and the rest of us had to crawl over her to get by. Did I mention my big sis currently holds the rank of Captain on the State Police Force? Snort.
Anyway, since it is now October 1st, I can officially decorate for Halloween without fear of being judged. When the kids were young, I used to go all out to get in the proper mood. The house was decorated with monster cutouts, glow in the dark plastic skeletons, ceramic jack-o-lanterns, big, black spiders and cobwebs. Okay. So the cobwebs were real... I was a working, divorced mother of four! Gimme a break!
Now that the kids are in college, I don't really have a good excuse to decorate the house in full Halloween haunting regalia, but I sure do miss those days. Instead I plan to reach a happy medium. Today I will set out my ceramics, fill the candy bowl with candy corn, peanuts, and M&Ms, get out the placemats and hang up Mr. Glow in the Dark Skeleton, and sit down and watch a scary movie from the good ole days (i.e. before the advent of the slasher movies). Something like Psycho, Frankenstein or Dracula,(the originals) or maybe even The Blob.
How do you--or do you--celebrate Halloween? Any haunted house, corn maze, seance tales to share? Any good ghost stories you'd like to share that we can tell around the campfire?
~Bullet Hole~
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7 comments:
We don't usually decorate for Halloween. We go out trick or treating with the kid.
My husband and I are huge haunted house fans though and have been to some fantastic ones. We've driven as far as 3 hours away to get to some of them.
I took my youngest who is going to be 12 this month to her first one last year and she loved it too. She had been begging me for years to take her because she loves being scared.
I'm not a fan of Halloween. Never have been. But my sister is a decorating fiend and will be paying me a visit in two weeks. She's warned that she plans on decorating everything in her path. Which means I'll be spending the day she leaves undoing it all. :)
My kids really enjoy haunted houses, too, Kristi. They've already made plans to attend several this month. I haven't been to one in some time, but I always got a big kick out of them, too.
Our family started a carving pumpkins party when our kids were young. They are now grown but our party continues. This year we will have my 87 yr. old mother, my sister and me, my nephew and his wife, and my two daughters - one with a husband and the other with her boyfriend. I look forward to when we have little ones again.
VBG Glad to know I'm not the only one who does the Halloween decorating thing early.
Skeleton shower curtain is up. Bloody handprints are on the living room window. Bought skeleton garland and skeleton glow-in-the dark pillow cases yesterday. Genius Kid is curled up on the couch with his Skelanimals blanket reading his library book. Just need to vaccum and dust, then pull out the rest of the decorations.
I LOVE this time of year!!
I love Halloween and have a blast handing out candy to the kids in our neighborhood while my husband takes our kids (and their friends) trick-or-treating through our neighborhood. Last year I started keeping a poll on the different costumes. *G*
After the kids are done trick-or-treating hubs will go to a haunted house, alone-I don't like them. And sometime that night he and I will watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
The week before the kids will pick out pumpkins and clean them out and pick out the design they want on the front and then either I or my hubs will carve it for them. We decorate our front porch and door with pumpkins, skeletons and on Halloween I sit out and hand out candy while the kids get a kick out of looking at our black cat through the storm door. *G*
(Since we have so many kids in our neighborhood that are small, I don't let hubs get too scary with the outside decorating. But, we do do a stuffed man out front. The trick is to use tissue paper and stuff those latex gloves with it to make realistic looking hands.) *G*
I've put out my pumpkin and that's about all I can do to decorate my little apartment. It's a personalized "Detroit Red Wings Hockey" pumpkin that my sister made for me in her crafts class.
Due to the fact that I live 2 miles from the local mall, I don't get any trick or treaters. (More candy for me :)!) I'm really excited for this years Halloween because my nieces (almost 2 & 4 years old) are finally old enough for us to take out trick or treating. I can't wait to take them to pick out their costumes!
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