Friday, October 30, 2009

What happened to Halloween?

I used to look forward to Halloween, when my mom would sew adorable costumes for the kids (she made all four of these!) and we’d take them trick-or-treating once around the block, then marvel at the 25 pieces of candy they each got, comparing, organizing, and maybe even tasting their loot.

Scan188, March 04, 2006

Such excitement was almost more than they could bear and by 8:30 they were in bed in their feet-pajamas, exhausted and happy.

These days, this seems to be Halloween (taken at our local Halloween store):

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Seriously?

This woman, rocking methodically in the creaking rocking chair, was just freaky.  Her mouth was absolutely terrifying!  Can you imagine a 4-year-old ballerina-princess coming upon this in some prankster’s front yard?!

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This refrigerator was jam-packed with… body parts. 

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Adorable, isn’t it?

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This kid was seen just a few minutes earlier, exploring the fridge.

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And this was just… well, call me a stick-in-the-mud, but this was just inappropriate!  This girls was just alone on the carpet…

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In her case, seeing her face actually added some levity!

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Kat found a new friend…

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As did Tom.

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I was just happy to run into George Clooney!

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He saved me from all the freaky, scary, disgusting stuff. Oh, George!

Fortunately, Shasta’s still willing to be cute on Halloween!

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See that adorable Raggedy Ann there in the first photo?  My sweet angelic Kat is going to Elisabeth’s Halloween party tonight dressed as a… well, you guessed it --

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…a devilish temptress!

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6 comments:

Tonya said...

"Contains huge foam breasts." Truly, what HAS become of Halloween??? That said, Kat makes an adorable devilish temptress.

I grew up with the innocence of Halloween costumes, too. When we moved to Maine for my senior year of high school, I was really shocked at the violent Halloween displays in yard after yard, absolutely everywhere. "Bodies" hanging from nooses in trees; elaborate "massacres" on the lawns or porches. Lots of ketchup. I'd never seen anything like it. The high school I went to? Their team was the "Witches!" (School colors were, you guessed it, black and orange). I guess that area was the hotbed of witch burning back in the day. I'm still traumatized!

Margaret said...

Yuck--it doesn't seem very fun to me. I loved the costumes, but didn't allow any gruesome or scary ones. So we did lots of princesses and animals. I love Kat's costume!!

AstroYoga said...

I agree - the violent images of Halloween are way over the top. I am not a big fan of celebrating violence in general. Bringing kids into it just feels wrong. In Germany, Halloween is still not a big thing, but the bits of it trickling over here are, unfortunately, more of the modern, ultraviolent images.

I think the idea of my little girl one day dressing up like a temptress on Halloween is also quite scary!

c said...

I really dislike gory images for Halloween. I like funny scary but not blood and zombies etc. Luckily around here gore doesn't seem to be prevalent or maybe I'm just missing it.
Your daughter is adorable. I hope she has good friends to party with who will keep the real devilish sorts away.

Anon said...

I don't know which is worse, the excessive gore, or the slutty costumes that women are expected to dress in.

Heidi said...

I'm really sad about the direction Halloween has taken. Even more so now that I have little ones, one of whom refused to even trick-or-treat after coming across 2 scary displays on our first two stops. That was it for her and with many tears she went home with daddy while I continued with her brother, who was sweet enough to politely ask for an extra piece of candy for his sister who was afraid.

I'm so sad for my daughter that the scary, nasty Halloween stuff has ruined it for her and other young children we know.

We also had to leave a Halloween fair hosted by the nearby high school when upon entering they dropped a bloody body down from the landing above right in front of my cute little Princess Jasime bedecked daughter. She screamed in terror and ran out of the building and refused to go back in. This after we had spent a good 10 minutes in the car trying to get her to be "brave" about some of the costumes we might see.

I know some people like to be scared, but when you're hosting a fair for young children (bouncy house, games, crafts, etc.) don't you think you could keep the scary part of the holiday confined to a particular area? (They did have a "haunted house" that we didn't even go near.)

Your daughter is gorgeous!

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