In Ohio, we had a tradition of hanging out with our former neighbor, Betty, every Halloween and help hand out candy on her block, because we didn't get too many trick-or-treaters in the country, where we lived. This year, several people from our Ohio church spent time with her for that night. We called her and she proudly informed, "Eleven people were here for hot cocoa!" That made our day. We really were missing Betty on Halloween.
To make the day a little spooky, and to check off something off my to-do list, I let Juni pick out something to dissect from her kit she had ordered and bought with her own money. She chose the frog. She and I outlasted the rest as we took apart every bit of it and even extracted the cornea from it's tiny eye. It was like a little plastic ball, so fascinating!
The night before Halloween, we took part in a Halloween fun night at our church's community center, which is an outreach to the local community. We helped hand out candy to the kids and had dinner with them. The pictures below were taken there.
We searched on-line and couldn't find any information regarding trick-or-treat times, except that our area gets to decide on it's own what we do. Evidently, that's code for "your neighborhood doesn't do much for Halloween".
Our new home is in a suburb with lots of retired neighbors. I asked two of them about the traditions and one said they would be in Aruba and the other said they'd be anywhere but home for Halloween. So, we waited for dark to come and see if anyone turned on their light out front. We were prepared with travel apple sauces and glow sticks (enough for 50 or so), and Ben agreed to wait for the doorbell. I decided since the neighborhood was darker than normal, we would seek out the trick-or-treating action. Unfortunately, it was raining...hard. The kids and I took off by car for a nearby neighborhood that has nice houses and found one block with some action. Lights on, kids with parents walking outside in the rain, perfect! We parked and got out. We walked to about five houses in the rain and were drenched to the bone. We knew Oregonians don't use umbrellas, and so we didn't bring those, but we did see others with ponchos on. That would have been smart. Clear trash bags would have worked. As you can see we had some on hand.
[Ezra is top left and Phoebe is the left Elsa in the front row. Juni had to remove her costume by this point so she could sit down to eat.]
In hindsight, the rain may have contributed to Phoebe's dress no longer lighting up or singing, "Let it Go." I'm not complaining though. We made sure a desk lamp with an extension cord was on our front porch since our porch light has a motion sensor and wasn't staying on for us. Two families, a total of three children, came by that night and we gave them double apple sauce and glow sticks. We have been eating applesauce everyday since and have yet to finish it all. And so you have our first, soggy Halloween in Oregon!
2 comments:
But that just seems mean...dressing up like a yummy candy but passing out applesauce for treats...:D
Sounds like some great memories were made Way to laugh through the rain!!
Those costumes rock.
Ben agrees with you, Rachel. I gave up trying to come up with GF, nut-free options that were candy and just went with easy. In a perfect world, I would have made something like caramel apples, but people just won't eat homemade anymore and I understand, but it stinks. I check your blog regularly, so you know...but am glad you don't post weekly, or I would feel super inadequate. :-)
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