Happy Halloween!

Hey everyone! Happy Halloween! Halloween is one of my favorite holidays of the fall season. Watson and I are having fun tonight giving out candy at home and watching my favorite, the seasonal classic, Hocus Pocus! I recently wrote a fictionalized account of our last Halloween when our lawn decor became more "trick" than "treat"! It was originally written in second person for the assignment and I've edited it for tonight. I hope you enjoy!

Trick or Treat!

I had just moved to town and was gearing up for our first Halloween in our new house. The neighbors had told us to expect lots of trick-or-treaters, that this was one of the most popular streets in town. We bought ten bags of candy just to make sure there was enough for all of the cute princesses, superheroes, and ghosts that were sure to stop by. No one was going without candy on our watch! I had made sure everything was perfect. The candy, our costumes, the decorations. Everything was just how we planned it.

            Except for the spooky eyes in the bushes. They looked so great on Pinterest. And so easy too! Just some cardboard toilet paper rolls with creepy eye shapes cut out and a glow stick shoved inside. How hard could that be? Well, first my scissors were terribly dull and just ripped the cardboard instead of cutting it. Once I dug through the boxes to find better scissors, I kept up my Susy Homemaker crafting and had five “spooky eye” toilet paper rolls ready to go in just a few minutes. Only, the one bush in the front of our house wasn’t thick enough to really hide the toilet paper rolls. Even in the dimming early evening light, they were clearly visible. Spooky effect ruined.

            No matter. There was still the ten bags of candy, our adorable non-scary costumes, and the blow up Snoopy in the front yard ready to greet our cute candy seekers. Snoopy and Woodstock peeping out of a pumpkin saying “Happy Halloween” was the crown jewel of our fall decorations. I had special ordered it from a Walmart in Indiana when none of the local Walmarts had it in stock. I even paid extra just to have it sent two-day shipping to ensure that it would grace the front lawn in time for Halloween. With everything ready, all that was left to do was wait for that doorbell to ring and to hear those kids trill “Trick or Treat!” in unison.

            The first set of kids stopped by dressed as Elsa from Frozen and a firefighter. How cute! They smiled sweetly when I handed them their Snickers, M&Ms, and Tootsie Pops. Elsa and the firefighter were quickly followed by a succession of kids in various costumes. In about 15 minutes, the candy bowl was empty! I dashed inside the house to refill your bowl in the ever-deepening dark of a late October evening. This was when the trouble began. I was opening the door to step back onto the little porch when I saw it, happening before my eyes. The little gang of trick-or-treaters that was heading for the front door didn’t see Snoopy’s black nylon strings tethering him and Woodstock to the ground. Before I could call out any kind of warning, a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle had clotheslined himself on the strings as he ran towards the door. Turtle on the half shell, no turtle power. I dropped the candy bucket to run down and help poor little Donatello up off the ground and make sure his mother didn’t have plans to sue us. I gave him and his whole group extra candy that I had scooped off the sidewalk and tried to figure out a way to avoid this disaster in the future. That’s when it hit me. The extra glow sticks from the failed decoration attempt! I could take some string and tie them onto the Snoopy tethers and the kids could see them.

            I hurriedly set about tying the glow sticks onto Snoopy as warning lights for the innocent children who might encounter him. I left my husband in charge of candy while I saved the day. And this worked, for about 30 minutes. We both ran inside to refill the candy bowl and check on dinner. In our absence, someone had pulled the glow sticks off of Snoopy’s strings as a Halloween prize. Here comes the “trick” part of the evening, we thought. I was about to rig up the last of my glow sticks to again mark Snoopy’s lines when the choir director from church unleashed her three kids on the front lawn. The six-year-old ran excitedly up to me, in search of the candy I had promised her the Sunday before. Six-year-olds don’t forget things like that. I was yelling “No, Sarah! Stop!” but it was too late. Sarah was doing a front flip over Snoopy and the wings on her angel costume only seemed to add more height. Her brother, dressed as Iron Man complete with Styrofoam muscles, tried to avoid his sister’s fate by going around the other side of Snoopy towards your front door. He managed to get caught in two of the strings and was briefly suspended in mid-air like a live action stunt before falling down and almost bringing Snoopy to the ground with him. At this point, I had had enough. After consoling the two crying kids, I unplugged Snoopy and Woodstock, letting them deflate to the ground in shame. I carried the candy bucket inside, turned off the porch lights, and locked the front door. I happily sank down onto the couch with a freshly unwrapped mini Snickers to drown my sorrows. This was how I had ruined Halloween. Oh, well. There’s always next year!