Avoiding Halloween

[ArmyBarmyMummy]

I am so glad Halloween is in half term and we're away this year.

I hate the masses of children bordering on youths who come knocking at the door with one shop bought mask between them. [hangry]

I hate the whole begging dressed up as 'trick or treating' to be honest [hblush]

I hate the whole commercial aspect, supermarkets cashing in on loads of confectionary, dressing up stuff etc

I hate the guilt trip. We're a Christian family (Army bit in nickname is The Salvation Army) but I've always taken the "It's just a bit of fun" rather than "celebrating evil" line. Which is right I'm not sure (views please) but I never want to deprive DC of some 'harmless' fun.

I do love smileys tho' and have no qualms about using the halloween ones [hsmile]

Another Pagan here [waves].

I shall be otherwise occupied on Samhain/Hallowe'en, so will not answer the door. I used to get involved as part of a big celebration of the day, but got a bit fed up with the teenagers/young adults begging on the door.

Oh yes, and I'm not sure whether anyone remembers, but originally the trick and the treat were supposed to come from the householder, not the person knocking the door [hsmile]

(Loving these smilies by the way!)

I have nothing against dressing up etc and enjoying it-I am just against the trick and treating. I, like Ishtar, wish that something hadn't been lost in the translation and that those doing it understood it was the householder who gives the trick or treat-especially the teenager who threw an egg at the window. I also think that 12 should be the very top age.

I hate the whole modern Halloween thing.My mum is Scottish and we had swedes or turnips carved out as children but there was no knocking on strangers doors;my mother would have been horrified at the intrusion on people ,she regarded it as the height of bad manners and very "common".
Not saying I agree but have never quite got over the manners thing ,would never allow my children to ask for sweets in return for knocking on a persons door .My American SIL thinks I am very weird

Fudge? I know whose house I'm visiting this year.

Letthereberock
"I must have lived in the posh part of Glasgow,and not known it. We always had pumpkins.

Who'd have the patience to carve a turnip? It's difficult enough to slice the bloody things."

I disagree, you must have lived in a more "common" part of Glasgow as the education you've received on Scottish history is obviously sub-standard. [hgrin]

Anyway, I'm just glad my DS if finally old enough to help me make his costume. My aunt and uncle are coming down from Aberdeen and my cousins should be coming across from Edinburgh and we'll have a big dooking (sp?) for apples at my mum and dads house, along with a small(ish) fire in the back garden with toffee apples and a real turnip lantern. I'm going to have to look up some turnip recipies now!!! So looking forward to it now!

[hsmile]

I'm familiar with the concept of guising,just didn't realise that it was still so commonly used.
I really haven't met anyone who still uses that term.
It's a good thing that they do though.Nice to see that the tradition is still kept up.

I admire you for having the requisite patience for tackling a turnip,but I'll be sticking with pumpkins.
Actually I don't have any of those either,do you think carved butternut squashes might catch on?

I love, love, love Halloween!

As other people have said, this is a truly Celtic tradition (rooted in the pagan festival of Samhain to celebrate the Celtic New Year) mixed in with a healthy splash of Christian tradition (All Hallows Eve and All Souls Day).

The traditions all stem from these including trick or treating which dates back to the middle ages and guising (or souling) when children and poor people would go door to door begging for "soul-cakes". The Americans have just picked up on all of these and run with them.

I think it's an absolutely delicious event - the idea that it's the night when the veil between the living and the dead is the thinnest and ghosts may walk the earth. Even as a child I remember going into my back garden with my brother and feeling the frisson of excitement looking into the cold clear dark and wondering what spirits might be hiding amongst the trees or sailing through the skies.

Course the event is more commercialised now - what event isn't these days?

We used to do bright lights parties! They were great fun.

I personally don't 'do' Halloween, although I might if we lived somewhere where it didn't consist of half-arsed attempts at costumes and begging for sweets/cash.

I'm from Edinburgh. I am not 45.

We called it guising and sang that little song about the goose getting fat and the penny in the old man's hat.
I don't remember pumpkins even being available, TBH. We had turnip lanterns, I can still remember how the metal kitchen spoon left red weals on my hand after I'd tried to scrape out the turnip flesh. And that singed smell, too.

We dooked for apples, had to try and get monkey nuts out of a chalk circle on the lino with a spoon held in our left hands, and got v sticky trying to eat treacle scones strung up in the air.

Nostalgia.

Yes,but you're from Edinburgh.That says it all.They're a weird lot there.

I wonder if people still give out monkey nut?
I think the kids threw them away as soon as they got them. The streets were always lined with them on Halloween.

I was born on halloween so I love it. The proper way though - we used to do bobbing for apples and that sort of thing and my mum was always very serious in that I knew what it was all about properly. When I was a kid people just didn't really trick or treat (we're not scottish so don't call it guising).

DH hates it, refuses to actually listen when I explain what it's all about. Which really pisses me off.

At school we used to celebrate halloween and then 1 november as well.

I do, however agree with everyone who is annoyed with the Americanisation and commercialism of it - I hate that too.

When I lived in central Dublin I HATED halloween cos you'd get all the little gouriers coming to try and burn your house down [hangry]

However, once I'd moved into the leafy suburbs in a family friendly area it was great, and my dd and all the other little ones loved it [hsmile]

It's fine now we live in a nice area of England. The "trick or treating" is only done at friends houses and then we all go to one house for a party. If I lived in some parts of the city, though, I bet I'd not like it so much.

If I were a Christian, I guess I would rather do the praying for souls (but that's all souls isn't it? Is that the day before? )

or the day after even! D'oh [hsmile] The Poles all went off to visit their dead relatives.

Oh and in Ireland you got a bank holiday! I'm definitely up for that! [hgrin]

I just love Halloween!! As a child (growing up in Canada), it was my fav holiday - better than Christimas!

DD is only 8 months and I am already looking forward to taking her to Canada for Halloween when she's a bit older.

On the other hand, I cannot stand bonfire night. I just hate the sound of fireworks everywhere until late at night! I feel like Jean Slater in Eastenders, heart racing every time I hear an explosion!!

We still do the more traditional guising round here. Love halloween.

When I was little we hollowed out a turnip but it was a devil of a job. Pumpkins are the future.

LetThereBeRock - I think it's not because you're from a posh part, but that you're younger. It's 30 years or so since I went guising, and I think that pumpkins and other such exotic veg had yet to reach Scottish shores.

Where we are the kids call it "trick or treating" BUT are still expected to do a party piece in return for their sweets. Most tell jokes, a few sing or recite a poem. We are lucky as we live in a quiet area and all teh kids know each other and most attend teh same school/ They go round in groups and over 8s don't tend to be accompanied by adults.
They do expect sweets though, whereas when I was wee it was mostly money. Also, we used to dress up as anything - it dodn't ahve to be scary whereas now the kids only seem to dress in scary outfits.

we always find a disco to go to ! [hgrin]