This is Halloween

All of my formative Halloweens were experienced in a suburb of Calgary, where middle-class families lived when they wanted to raise their children in a nice, safe neighbourhood. We had almost 400 kids visit our door every year - a constant stream of witches and devils and carebears and power rangers. In Calgary, it always snowed before the first halloween, so you had to be able to wear your snowsuit underneath your costume. This meant no gypsies. Sometimes it dipped into the -20s, which meant that one of your parents had to drive block to block in the mini van, allowing you to jump in and stick your fingers into the heating vent until you could feel them again. This was typically my mom's job. My mom and stepdad used to answer the door with pantyhose stretched over their head ... I wish I had a picture of it. I wish I had a picture of a lot of my halloweens.

Here are the costumes that I can remember I had:
Papa Smurf (I wore my smurf PJs and my mom painted my face blue)
A tap dancing cat (made by grandma)
A princess (made by grandma)
A Cow (full body cow suit with head piece and udders ... priceless)
A Witch (complete with face nose and warts stuck all over my face)

After I was 11, Halloween gets a bit blurry. For a few years, I would hand out candy or help to take my sisters out trick-or-treating. After that, my friends started to throw halloween parties that were always a lot more fun to attend than hanging out at home with your parents.

I was never a huge halloween person, but I'm sure that once I'm a parent I'll be one of those fanatical moms who spends hundreds of hours hand sewing her kids' costumes. It just seems like the kind of person I would be. But as for the ghools and the ghosts? Give me Valentine's Day, any day. I don't like being frightened and I don't like the dark and everything that goes along with it (except kissing in the dark, which isn't halloween related at all!)

Wishing you a safe Halloween, whatever you might be doing. I will probably be spending it working on my lesson planning, and that is just fine with me.
-Bri