Did you grow up not "celebrating" Halloween? Did you not trick or treat or wear costumes? When it comes to your kids, do you allow them to wear costumes or trick or treat? Do you pass out candy?
I'm really only looking for those who do (or did) not celebrate or observe Halloween. I'm not looking for the history of the day or why it is or isn't that serious. Just want to know if there is anyone out there that was raised not celebrating and what they do now that they have kids. Sorry, but some people can take stuff too far :). TIA!
Added: Thanks for all of the responses so far. No right or wrong answer, i just dont want this to turn into a debate. For those that do not celebrate Halloween, do you allow your kids to go to school in costumes?
My son's preschool is not allowing costumes but kids can dress in festive/Halloween clothes or colors if they choose, so no issues with school this year. They will have a trunk or treat but we have decided to stay home. Our next big issue that came up was if we were going to participate in the phantom house activity that goes through the neighborhood and what to do about the trick or treaters since we just moved. We decided we would join in and we will pass out candy. We aren't going to decorate other than what we received from the phantom ghost and our son probably won't dress up. He will be excited to see all of the kids coming by, so we will just play it by ear. It's a happy medium between me and my husband who were raised differently when it comes to Halloween. Thank you guys for all of your input!
When I was younger, we didn't celebrate at all. No trick or treating, no passing out candy, nothing.
I let my daughter go trick or treating and we pass out candy after we are done.
We did, but we did not do any of the scary stuff... we were more 'fall festival' people, but we still dressed up and trick or treated, carved pumpkins and passed out candy. No scary movies, no scary costumes or haunted houses, no scary decorations... so I guess we were borderline, avoiding the scary part as much as possible. We are also very religious, it's truly a personal preference as far as religion goes.
As an adult, we pretty much do the same thing. Any kind of Halloween movie is going to be Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin ,things like that, not horror movies. Well, we don't watch those anyways.
One of our favorite holidays. I loved thinking up a costume. I loved trick or treating in the dark. I loved when people liked my costume. And now I LOVE handing out the candy. Especially the little neighbor kids.. I get so excited for them.
When our daughter was little we had 12 children all about the same age. We held parties that night so we could all eat together.. Then we would take our children and take them Trick our treating. (we carried adult beverages) as we walked the neighborhood.
One of my friends (she was one of our daughters elementary teachers) we host a "Withes Tea" No tea is ever served, but good wine Margaritas and punch are available. We all wear our fancy witches hats and visit.. the Cackling is thunderous!
We do not have anything to do with halloween. We do decorate for autumn. But, no halloween. We live in the country and homeschool, so it doesn't effect us one way or the other anyway. I do despise taking my children into stores during this time of year though, but especially stores like Michaels that have horrible and scary decorations. I made that mistake a year or two ago, and my little one was so frightened by the gore. Now, the kids do like to dress up in costumes, but we do that all year round. And, we eat candy. The kids don't have to go begging for it. :) Well, they do have to ask Daddy. But Daddy always says yes. Or so I'm told. We're all for fun and celebrating life. We just don't celebrate death and the death culture.
If I could pick one holiday to spend as a kid again, it would be Halloween. You got to pick out a cool costume, wear it to school, then go out trick-or-treating for candy that night. We never pulled any pranks on people, just got our loot and had fun. I never grew up with any notion that it was evil, a celebration of death, or a holiday for the devil. My daughter is now 4 and has her Halloween costumes planned for the next 5 years. Some schools here do Halloween and some do a Fall Festival - same school district but I guess it is up to the individual schools to do as they wish.
Sorry, I think Fall Festival in place of Halloween, or Trunk-or-Treat, or treat gathering at the Mall, is kinda lame. If it makes parents feel better, if it's safer, it's their right to raise their children however they see fit - but for my daughter it will be Halloween and true trick-or-treating in our neighborhood all the way.
As for costumes, the slutty and/or goth themed ones for 6 year olds bothers me more than scary gory ones for adults.
My husband grew up with NO trick-or-treating, no pumpkin decor, no costumes (at Halloween time, he could dress up as Superman any regular day).
I grew up not necessarily "celebrating" halloween, but yes dressing up and trick-or-treating.
Now that we have a son, we DO let him dress up and trick-or-treat. We don't do a lot of halloween decor. I'd honestly rather do fall decor since it lasts a whole month or two as opposed to only a few weeks of Halloween. I think my husband defered to me on this one b/c we have so much fun with my neice and son trick-or-treating together. It's a fun tradition. I may not see my neice on Thanksgiving, maybe not at Christmas, but for SURE we get together at Halloween.
We do celebrate Halloween but I do see alternate ways of celebrating such as harvest festivals. If I didn't celebrate, I would still let my kids dress up at school, just not in a typical "scary" Halloween costume. Princesses and firemen are common enough to not make your kids feel conspicuous.
I grew up not celebrating. I never dressed up and never went trick or treating. My husband did go trick or treating. Our kids do not. We have debated and talked this out for several years. We now do a big candy and hot dog giveaway with our church on Halloween. The kids do not dress up for it. I do allow them to dress up for "dress up day" as we call it for the local library story time that we go to each week.
No. In South Africa, we did not celebrate Halloween. As christians we believed it to be wrong, and no one dressed up and went out for free candy.
I grew up without Halloween. Still don't find it any reason to celebrate it.. But that is personal. (I still get shivers when I see churches with big signs.. HALLOWEEN Celebration this weekend,.. uhhmm WHAT? Seriously?In church? wow. Anyway....)
My son is 3 and I guess if he really wanted to dress up and go have some fun with friends when he is older, as long as he understands why we don't celebrate it... I am ok with him having a bit of fun, for the sake of fun.. not for the sake of Halloween.
We celebrated when I was a kid, and we celebrate now that I have kids. By celebrating I mean that we carved pumpkins, dressed in costume and trick or treated and/or passed out candy. I love Halloween. What I don't love is how gory and realistic the gross costumes have gotten. Some of it just seems to be too much and it turns a fun dress up spooky holiday into a terrifyingly scary one for little kids. I don't know if I helped with your question since I've always celebrated, but that's my take on it.
My M. always got us costumes and sent us out while she passed out candy. She never decorated for anything except a Christmas tree and lights.
Our church does Fall/Harvest festival with no scary costumes and awesome games and food. We also trick-or-treat where we know people and then go home to pass out candy.
I love Halloween and grew up celebrating it. For several years after having kids, I really didn't get into it. I didn't really celebrate ANY holidays with my kids until they were big enough to start remembering things. We're now a "prime Halloween celebrating age." (9 and 10). So this year will be a lot of fun.
I know my view is backwards, but oh well. ;o)
I have a friend who does not, and for religious reasons. The church she attends has a Fall Festival instead and that is where she spends her Halloween with her children.
We have Always celebrated Halloween and we were raised Catholic. I have friends who did not celebrate it and their kids felt left out .. and now they dress them up-- but not in anything 'ghoulish' or scary... either a super hero or like a cowboy ... Personally-- kids like it because of the costumes and ccandy!! go for it!
my family didn't "celebrate" Halloween growing up. We was never allowed to dress up and go trick or treating, nor did we even pass out candy to those that came to the door! My parents were very "Christian" and would say it "celebrates" satan by doing dressing up and such...
I have my own little family now, and I don't have a problem with dressing up as long as it's not a scary or skimpy costume. I do not allow my kids to go trick or treating tho in neighborhoods because with this day/age and all the sick people out there you never know just what they've done with or to the candy they are passing out!
our church has what they call a "fall festival" on Halloween where they have games, bouncy houses and such where the prizes are candy and you can go dressed up and everything, so we do that every year, because its safer!
My parents were very "religious" b/c they felt even saying the word Halloween was like worshipping the devil. But they had double standards b/c they let us dress up every year and go Trick or Treating, only b/c we got alot of candy. So, I grew up knowing Halloween was bad and the devil's day, but I still got to dress up and get my loot.
Oh my
My father and myself love Halloween, we have a large coffen he made by hand himself a long time ago, we have a 5 foot skeleton (that hangs from under the stairs in the basement the rest of the year, by the punching bag..) We have fake rought iron fencing we put up, we LOVE halloween.
We usually have really nice costumes, shoes to go with, and now that I work at Hot Topic its Halloween Galore
and me and my dad love gore! We have the fake blood, the latex paint and appliques to put on body parts, the makeup (both talented with makeup)
To us, its me and my dads celebration. My birthday is 4 days after, and its usually celebrated together because I've been facinated with gore and horror movies and the like since I was small.
I do respect everyone's opinion on it though, it is a land of the free, and its free for all. I may celebrate, but I know others do not and I do not push it down their throats of why its okay or safe.
I grew up without Halloween. I was raised Jewish, in a Jewish neighborhood, had Jewish friends, and went to a Jewish school so I never felt like I missed out on anything. Now Halloween is everywhere. My 4 year old sees the billboard signs, the tv shows, the costumes in the store. It is natural for him to want to dress up for Halloween or quite frankly any other day of the week. We don't "celebrate" halloween but I do hang up some decorations, give out candy to the adorable children, and take my son trick or treating around the neighborhood. It is actually a great experience and gives me a chance to meet some of the neighbors I wouldn't otherwise meet. My son is allergic to milk and nuts and we still do it but I have a bag of treats to swap out when we get home. And yes, I allow my son to go to school in costume the same way I allow him to go to school in pajamas on pajama day. One of his favorites :)
