When did your DC grow out of trick or treating?

[BillHadersNewWife]

Please...please no snide comments about how your DC never have because it's "begging" or whatever! Both my DDs have loved it for years...now the youngest has decided to hang up her treat bag aged 11.

The older DD is also not doing it this year...but she's 15 and that's normal. Is 11 quite young to stop? I don't mind...it's up to her..but part of me worries she might think "Oh I should have gone!" when we're answering the door to all the kids...but that in itself might be fun mightn't it?

My ds1's school recommended not to go out. However he is (y9) as he has younger siblings and we usually go with big group of friends with little ones too from 3 to 14!

@ArnoldWhatshisknickers NO WAY is my DD going out unsupervised at night at 6 years old! Are you crazy?!?!?!

@Daddystilllost I agree with you, but in the village these teens are in it's quite common for older ones to be out so people aren't too bothered. I'm only going out with them as ones a relative who wants to take my baby with them but I'm too nervous to let them take baby alone

I assumed that dd would want to stop when she got to secondary school but she was still excited (both by the dressing up and by the free sweets). She kept going for another couple of years as did some of her friends. They only went to decorated houses and I'm pretty sure they were polite and not too grabby.

I've had a few groups of teenagers coming round and trick or treating . Pre having kids, I'll admit to not liking the idea of teens knocking on the door (I subconsciously absorbed the stereotypes). After having kids I was more open minded.

It might be different in different areas. Round here, the teens - while clearly not as cute as little ones - come round in small groups, are polite rather than intimidating, and you get reminded that although they like to think that they're so grown up, they're still just big kids.

Maybe it's down to where people live. If you live in an area where you have troublesome teens / gang violence / kids with ASBOs etc, you might be more reticent about opening your doors to older teens. However, if (like me) you live in a naice village where you know all the children already, then perhaps a group of teens is not so scary if you know it's just "Joe, John and little Paul" etc.

That said I don't give to teens who don't dress up!

We've never had any intimidating behaviour from teens, everyone here seems to stick to the no pumpkin no knock rule and teens tend to go out slightly later (after 7) than the
younger children, so anyone who wants to can take their pumpkin in at that point.

Our kids were told at 11 that next year would be their final TorT year, so they each made the most of it when they hit 12 and were happy to have Hallowe’en movie nights or parties or zombie-killing-game-sessions thereafter.

Trick or treating is great fun, but it’s for kids.We bring the pumpkin in and turn off the lights around 7ish when the primary school kids have stopped coming.

Our family rule is to stop t&t when the children go up to secondary school. We are hosting a party for my dd (12) tonight, just silly party games and food with friends. They'll have plenty of sweet treats too, so won't miss out on that front. She'll also dress up to hand out the sweets to the little children.
I love Halloween, but do feel t&t is for younger children. There are other ways to celebrate when they get older. We live in a lovely village and it seems to be the trend around here for t&t to stop at year 7.

Last year in primary - DS realised everyone else was younger than him and that was that.

We do get a few older horrors round here with no manners who try to grab the sweets urgh.