If you have kids, don’t ruin the magic of the holiday by simply trudging alongside them in your sweats checking your iPhone. What better excuse to retire your role as taskmaster and be a kid with your kids for a day? Get into the spirit; dress up, act scared of dark shadows and howling neighborhood dogs.
Don’t let the kids have all the fun on Halloween. Whether or not you have kids of your own, Halloween can be fun for grown-ups too. This holiday is one big invitation to fly your freak flag, a chance not to be wasted!
If You Have Kids
If you have kids, don’t ruin the magic of the holiday by simply trudging alongside them in your sweats checking your iPhone. What better excuse to retire your role as taskmaster and be a kid with your kids for a day? Get into the spirit; dress up, act scared of dark shadows and howling neighborhood dogs. Your family could even choose theme costumes, you could each dress up like a character from Scooby Doo, or the Wizard of Oz (got a black dog? Boom, Toto!).
Most Trick-or-Treating doesn’t start until dusk, but that doesn’t mean you have to wait to get the party started. Go to the Dollar store and grab some cheap toilet paper – no, not for tee-peeing neighbors who aren’t handing out candy – to play the Mummy game with your kids! Pair off, hand each pair a roll of TP and see who can cover their partner in mummy wrap first. Or, as long as you’re nearby with a towel and ready to grab your kid if they get too determined, bobbing for apples is a Halloween tradition. Just be sure they do this before you put on their Halloween make-up.
Holding a Halloween shindig at home for your kids and their friends is a good alternative if you live in a neighborhood that doesn’t jive with Trick-or-Treating. You can make a sunny kitchen dark and creepy in no time with a steaming pot of apple cider (get a block of dry ice for the steam, steaming hot cider and little kids don’t go together) and a couple of blindfolds and ‘mystery’ bowls full of ‘body parts.’ Use cold spaghetti for brains, wet grapes for eyeballs, baby carrots for fingers, gross! Be sure to play creepy music or snag one of those Halloween soundtrack CDs at the drugstore. Better yet, make your own! Who wouldn’t want to record themselves screaming and moaning and rattling chains? Sounds like a fun afternoon.
If You Don't Have Kids
Even if you don’t have kids, you can still get in on the nostalgia of the holiday. Decorate your house, even sticking a pumpkin on the front porch should do the trick, and turn your porch light on. These are the classic signs that tell Trick-or-Treaters ‘there is candy in here, and we want to give it to you.’ Be sure to act properly terrified when you answer the door and find little goblins and, here’s a nice touch, bow in reverence when you find a 6-year-old princess on the other side.
How about giving the Trick-or-Treaters a taste of their own medicine and give them a scare? My brother used to dress as a stuffed scarecrow and slouch in a chair on the front porch, complete with straw sticking out of his sleeves and a hat pulled down over his face. Then, as Trick-or-Treaters approached he would whisper ‘Happy Halloween,’ at which point they would do one of two things: jump out of their skin, or run screaming. Another trick of his was to cut a hole in the bottom of the bowl of candy he would offer, so that when the kids reached in to take their prize, his hand would shoot out from the stash. Again, they would either jump, or run screaming. Fewer ran screaming, once they’d seen the candy. As a rule, it seems like childless couples give out the best stuff.
Caution, if you give out ‘brand name chocolate’ those little devils will be expecting it every year, and you don’t want to fall victim to the ‘trick’ in ‘Trick-or-Treat.’
Once you’re done terrorizing the neighborhood children, why not enjoy Halloween doing what couples do best?
Carving Pumpkins can be sexy. There, I said it. If you’re carving a pumpkin, you’ve got your hands in the orange goo, pulling out seeds and mush. You’re probably going to get it on your clothes and, oops, your partner’s clothes too. You’re both definitely going to have to take a shower. Then light those candles and turn out the lights to get the full effect of the devilish face you carved into your pumpkin.
It gets better. Save the seeds, rinse them and toast them in the oven, and put on your favorite horror film. That way you can cuddle up after your shower, munch on seeds (which pair nicely with red wine) and get spooked together. Finally, an added bonus: studies show that the smell of pumpkin pie is an aphrodisiac, so now you know what to do with your pumpkin once it’s completed its turn as a jack-o-lantern.
If you want to get even sexier, Halloween is a great excuse for you and your partner to put on some costumes and role play without making, you know, a permanent lifestyle choice. There is an endless array of sexy Halloween costume choices, vampire (they were sexy way before TWILIGHT, they’ve been sucking people’s necks for centuries), witch (who can turn you into a frog if you don’t obey her orders), gypsy (this one’s all about the laced-up peasant top and the bangle earrings), harem girl (enough said). If you and your partner opt for a night out on the town, or at a Halloween party, maybe choose a pair of matching costumes and secretly play the parts. A naughty priest and nun could be casting each other sly glances across the room all night. Bonnie and Clyde could be staking the joint. A gorilla and a giant banana – well, I don’t know what to do with that one.
The origin of Halloween goes way back, over 2000 years, to a Celtic festival during which villagers would light bonfires throughout the night and wear costumes to ward off roaming ghosts that might bring illness or destroy their crops. Thankfully, things have gotten a little more light-hearted since then, and most of us don’t have crops, but that’s no excuse to let the tradition die! Halloween is a time for kids of all ages to play in the dark. Enjoy!
