Halloween General Discussion

[Dave-O2]

Good Morning everyone 🙂

Just popping in this weekend, to start a general discussion thread, where you can share any decorations, costumes, traditions, or spooky stories from the past 👻

I'll start by sharing some small house decorations that I currently have sitting around.

I also have a big bowl of sweet stuff on standby, just in case I get a few knocks on the door this coming Tuesday 🍬

Over to you............

[Cleoriff]

Good morning @Dave-O2 

I'm afraid I do little nowadays, mainly as we have so few kids knocking on our door. We live in a cul-de sac which isn't well lit so they tend to avoid us. So no pumpkins outside etc

Also apart from 3 houses (with no kids) it's mainly elderly folk who live here.

However, I do have a purse full of change which I hand to any children who come round with parents.

Back in the day when my grandson was younger, I used to take him round the estate, dressed in very 'scary costumes' ' He usually came with a little friend. Had to be quite strict about the amount of sweets they ate. Not keen on the 'sugar rush'effect. 😂

The football club he played for had the occasional Halloween night fancy dress.

I had an outfit, bought in the US, which was a long black/purple dress with a stand up collar in purple with a headpiece crown made of small bones and thorns.

I had a lot of theatre make-up (From our Rocky Horror days) so a very white face, black lipstick, khol black eyes and 'blood' streaking from my mouth. My husband went as Dracula. My grandson was a zombie.

It was a great night with everyone having a 'lovely time'.

So in answer to your question, we don't really do much nowadays. I do have a few artificial candles flickering. All decorations are saved for going a bit OTT at Christmas.

Halloween is very big in the US so here's a picture of a decorated house over there

[pgn]

Thankfully, no need to go out around the houses trick-or-treating any more, youngest is happy to stay in and answer the doorbell and offer sweets to caller's, plus dipping in himsekf. Pumpkin carving is a thing, though, and all in the house over the days preceding Halloween muck in - I save some of the offcut pumpkin flesh for a Halloween soup, and occasionally will toast the seeds - these get consumed over the next couple of days. Thank goodness Thanksgiving does not have to be similarly contended with... 😖

[Enlli]

In our house we keep some of the traditions of Samhain. It is one of the 8 Sabbats in the Pagan Calendar. Traditionally, it is the time when the veil between the world's is thin and a time to remember our Ancestors.

It is also a time when the natural world starts to go into sleep ready to reappear at Imbolc at the start of February. For many Pagans it is the new year.

We here use it to remember our ancestors and give thanks for their lives. We also see it as a time to take stock of the previous year and plan for the future.

There are many customes associated with this time, too many to mention

[Dave-O2]

Thanks for sharing @Cleoriff, @pgn and @Enlli 

No knocks to report on my door so far, however, i'm prepared just in case 🍬😂