Halloween Memories

Ah, Halloween!

Growing up, my family didn’t have a lot of money. It was the eighties and a deep recession, so my parents often found creative ways to make our holidays fun and memorable on a shoestring budget.

Easters, we made our own baskets as a craft project using leftover green plastic strawberry fruit containers, pipe cleaners, and construction paper. We then filled them with some plastic grass and made colored eggs. A few pieces of chocolate, lots of jelly beans, and maybe a Peep or two, and there we had it. Looking back, it probably wasn’t much, but it meant the world to us to have this little treat.

Halloweens were also a very “home grown” affair. My parents were fearful about sending us out trick-or-treating after a rash of incidents where razorblades and other unsavory items were found in candy. (Can you say “Trick”?) To keep us safe, they would plan a Halloween bash for us kids. And by “us kids” I mean all of my many cousins and school friends along with my two sisters and I.

Few could afford those fancy costumes, so we made our own…to varying degrees of originality and hilarity! In fact, I still often remind my now 6’ 3” cousin of the time he came as “Diaper Man: the “superhero” toddler wearing nothing but a diaper, a towel tied around his neck as a cape, and a generous all-over dusting of baby powder.

The preparations would begins many days before with an annual trip to Newton to go pumpkin hunting with my Uncle, his two daughters (my cousins), and my sisters. We’d all pile into his car and he’d take the scenic route through the darkened streets as we sang along to radio hits, or played word games, like Concentration, and even would sing some of our original songs we made up, like one called “Buns” with the silliest lyrics imaginable. (Please, don’t ask! LOL)

When we arrived at the farm, we’d fan out in search for the perfect pumpkins to carve a couple of jack-o-lanterns. Of course, they had to be huge, round, and as unblemished as possible. Once we claimed our prizes, we’d stop in for a nice cup of cider and would head home for some carving, though, more often than not, we’d just draw a jack-o-lantern face with blackened out spaces in order to preserve the pumpkin for later cooking. Waste not, want not! But for those we did carve, we’d season and bake the pumpkin seeds for a snack later.

And did we buy decorations? No way! We foraged in the yard for dry maple leaves and tacked them on the wall and scattered them on the floor of the party room. Usually we had some inexpensive yellow and black streamers we’d tack on the walls. One year, we gathered some old clothes together and made a headless “body” by stuffing the jeans and shirts with leaves and propped it in the corner.

My mother would do all the cooking—usually time-tested inexpensive party foods like hotdogs, chips, homemade candy apples, and the like, but would make her special fizzy orange brew with sherbet ice cream and soda, and would make a special cake with orange icing and candy corn decorations. All the kids, because we couldn’t go trick-or-treating, got little goody bags filled with candy.

Of course while we danced the night away to Michael Jackson’s Thriller in our homemade costumes, even if those costumes were just some of moms lipstick smeared on our cheeks and a paper hat, we all had a blast. Some of my cousins, now grown, still talk about those parties wistfully.

A few weeks ago as I wandered through iParty looking for cake decorating items, I noticed a mom in the store with her son, who looked about 6 or 7 years old. Of course he was bouncing around the store wanting to touch and play with everything. He was pulling down costumes—Spiderman, Batman, Obama mask—showing them to his mom. She had to tell him time after time: “We can’t afford that. Put it back.” Of course he kept putting up a fit and begging for those expensive, elaborate costumes (I mean, who hasn’t? Sorry, mom.)

I just want to reassure all those families in this crazy, economic climate, that even though money may be tight, there are so many ways to make Halloween memorable without spending tons of money. So what if the kid next door is sporting the latest “Super Suit”? Kids will have fun no matter what they’re wearing. There no one “right” way to do Halloween or any other holiday. Make your own special traditions with whatever budget you have, and you’ll create happy memories that will last a lifetime.

Kirsten Blocker
Marketing & Communications Coordinator
Crittenton Women's Union