"You HAVE to give us sweets!"

[Cat]

Apparently since I don't give out candy and actually went out last night, means someone can swipe one of my pumpkins. Sad thing is, it wasn't near my steps, it was by my door to avoid pumpkin swipers. Sigh

[MaggieTheCat]

We have good trick or treaters in our area. I always hear all these horror stories that people post here about rude parents/kids and am worried that we'll get them too, but our neighborhood is great. We even got one group of teens who didn't expect candy but were grateful to get some. There were three of them and they looked like they were escorting their younger siblings around. I gave the little ones their candy, then looked at the teens (who all had costumes on but no candy bag) and asked if they wanted some. All three of their faces lit up and they were like, "Sure!" "If you insist!" It made me happy.

I can't believe some of the stories I read here.

[Pagan]

This year I had errands to run (shipping quilts) so I just hung my candy pumpkin on Francesca, my 3 foot tall metal flamingo on my porch.

Lady: "Yeah, it's Halloween." Meanwhile her kids that she's escorting are pawing through the candy.
Me: "Yeah and the candy's right there, feel free to have some. My small children are in bed trying to sleep, that's why we put it out here this year."
Lady: Catbuttface and walks off.
Me:

I just don't get some people. I'd like to know just what it was she was expecting from you? Kids didn't seem to have any problem finding the candy.

which reminds me... whenever halloween is close to a weekend, i always see some county trying to "change" the trick-or-treat day to ensure the kids aren't out on a weeknight.

which is interesting because they haven't yet figured out... no one listens to that. i heard it suggested here on the radio i think but ... nope no one went out as far as i know on sunday.

I just saw a poll like that yesterday. To move it to the last Saturday of October. And they don't get why you can't move Halloween. It wasn't just arbitrarily put on the 31st, it's that date for a reason!

[Pojodan]

As my roomates were out partying and I was busy missing the days when Halloween was about going wild with decorations and having a giant teddy bear hanging from a noose drop in front of you when the door opened wasn't frowned upon, I made sure the house was locked tight and all the lights were off.

Sure enough, though -ding dong! Ding dong ding dong ding dong ding dong ding dong- -knock knock- -pound pound-

Seriously x.x

[sevendaysky]

In a few minutes I'm going out to the community mailbox to post a flyer. The text of said flyer is as follows:

"To the person who stole the candy bucket from Space 74:

You are a rude jerk.

Return it immediately."

There will be no decorations, no candy, no nothing next year, and I am going to go to the manager and request that they institute a no-candy policy for next year. They already had to ban 4th of July and Easter egg hunts due to stupid people in the park.

Background: When we moved in here 3 years ago I had my service dog. He is trained to alert me when someone knocks/rings the bell. He also barks for 10-15 seconds before doing so. Roomie and I did not want to deal with it, so we blacked out the house and put a cheap dollar store cauldron on the front steps with a sign that said "Shh, ghosts sleeping. Take one. Happy Halloween." We didn't get anyone knocking on the door. Same with last year. THIS YEAR, however, I asked my roomie to bring in the bucket when he gets home (he gets home at 11:30 pm due to work) - I get up and don't see the bucket anywhere in the house. He's not awake yet so I can't ask him if he put it in some stupidly illogical place. I went outside to get something from my car- no bucket OR sign. Yay, someone decided to steal it. Now, it's a dollar store bucket and about 4 or 5 dollars' worth of dollar-store treats, but dammit it's the principle of the thing.

[Kogarashi]

What I want to know is since when does Trick or Treating start BEFORE dark? I always set out at dusk to get a good start, but nowadays it seems like all the candy is gone and all the kids are home by 6pm.

I know I took my girls out starting at 5:45 while it was still light out because they were younger (ages 2 and almost-5). I didn't want to keep them out terribly late or worry about visibility issues for the whole trip. When they get older, we'll push the trick-or-treat time back, but for now, I see it as a bit of a safety issue for the littles.

Of course, this also reflects off of what I was used to growing up. In my hometown, the toddlers would all be out around 4-6, trick-or-treating in broad daylight (we at least waited until closer to twilight) so they could get home to dinner and early bedtime. 6-9 or so was when the older kids came out trick-or-treating, with the high schoolers waiting a bit later than the middle-schoolers. 9pm or so was the unofficial wrap-up time, since by that point most houses had run out of candy and the teenage vandals started to come out. Straggling trick-or-treaters headed home then because no one wanted egg on their costumes.

[Andara Bledin]

We got lucky and didn't have any jerks or punks at our new place. A bunch of cute little kids in cute costumes, a couple of lazy kids who looked like they were only out 'cause it was a family thing, and some late ones that couldn't be bothered to try coming up to the house with the open door, the Halloween lighting through the window with no curtain, the lit display and black cat decoration in the other window, and the porch light still on. Their loss.

^-.-^

[ArcticChicken]

What I want to know is since when does Trick or Treating start BEFORE dark?

Since they changed daylight savings time.

[Quillsilver]

My husband and I love Halloween. Our first year together, we stocked up on candy and were really looking forward to seeing the costumes - we figured that since we lived in an apartment complex with a ton of kids, we'd get lots of trick-or-treaters.

Nada. Not a single kid knocked on our door the whole freaking night.

We've been married for ten years, and we have never had a single kid come by for candy, no matter where we lived. We haven't even bothered getting candy the past few years. I miss Halloween

[Seshat]

What I want to know is since when does Trick or Treating start BEFORE dark?

I know I took my girls out starting at 5:45 while it was still light out because they were younger (ages 2 and almost-5). I didn't want to keep them out terribly late or worry about visibility issues for the whole trip. When they get older, we'll push the trick-or-treat time back, but for now, I see it as a bit of a safety issue for the littles.

That's pretty much what I was going to say. For the smallest ones, it's safer to trick-or-treat in daylight.
Older kids should be out around dusk, however.

[MadMike]

Guys, please take another look at what Protege posted earlier in the thread:

Uh guys? We're skirting Fratching here. Can we please redirect our attention to the idiots the OP mentioned...and leave the castle law stuff to Fratching?

We had to delete a post because someone went and did exactly what we asked everyone not to do. If it happens again, we'll have to close the thread, and possibly hand out infractions.

[Food Lady]

Yep no light = go away we don't want you here . Me, I sit on my front porch with several large bowls of candy. My house is very popular

I love this image.

[EricKei]

What I want to know is since when does Trick or Treating start BEFORE dark?

I've been seeing the news and other outlets recommending daylight candy scavenging for years ^^;

it was by my door to avoid pumpkin swipers. Sigh

I dunno if swipers have ever been an issue around here. Their evil mutated cousins the pumpkin SMASHERS, yeah, but not swipers per se.

[LadyAndreca]

I used to live in an area where trick-or-treating wasn't allowed on Sundays because you couldn't have all "that stuff" on the holy day of the week. I'm sure they expected their children to burst into flame for being so wicked or something. But there was a different way to let people know not to expect candy there - notes left on doors to explain that that particular family did not celebrate Halloween and to please not knock. I might not have really understood why people wouldn't celebrate such a fun holiday back then, but we left those houses alone.

[Jetfire]

First Hallowe'en in my Condo. I didn't have many things, but I did have my light on and a cheap lit up set of hanging skulls I could hang and have flashing outside. I got a total of 10 people.

What was a bit strange is my Condo's (all have outside doors) are set up like | | | (each | is a row of condos). I'm in the middle bar, so I can look out my back door and see the other side. I saw lots of groups going around behind my condo... but only got 4-5 groups in front.

Oh well, I have a lot of rockets and cheap gum and chocolate bars now.

Hopefully next year we'll have more people. This year was the first year the entire complex was built so maybe people don't know it too well.

Kids did start around 6, though I didn't get my first till around 7. Last was just after 9 I think.

Oh and before I went home, I walked to the grocery store to get some extra candy. My path takes me behind the horse stables for the race track, and I spotted a friendly black cat. A coworker was in front of me and petted it before it ran off. It didn't have any tags we could see, so it was probably a barn cat, but hopefully he kept his head down that night.