Mum not coming on Halloween - irked?

[CleverAzureDreamer]

My mum has just let me know she’s having her hair done on Thursday evening next week so she won’t be coming over to ours to go trick or treating and watch a spooky movie with the kids (8, 10, 12). I’m slightly irritated by this as I thought it would have been nice to have a family night dressed up and go round taking the kids trick or treating.
I’ve allowed older DS to bring a friend over to come with us so it won’t be so empty but I just found it a bit selfish for a Nan to not want to spend Halloween with the grandkids! AIBU?

For all those saying it's Scottish or Irish and not American I get that it started in Scotland and Ireland and that's where the Americans got it from. But I don't think the way it is done in England now, which is a reasonably recent thing, does come from Scotland or Ireland. It's come from American films and TV and is an American import.

Why else would it have only become a thing in England over the last few decades when it's been a thing in Scotland and Ireland for centuries and not have travelled to England till relatively recently?

Halloween is not remotely in the same basket as Easter and Christmas 😂
Those are major festivals which include 2 days of public holidays each.
Halloween is a tacky americanism, a bit of lighthearted fun for the kids at best.
Its definitely not something to fuss over as 'family time', in fact surely its the opposite, kids usually trick or treat out with their mates, not with nan?

Because it’s not Christmas! You can enjoy without her!!

You seem a bit culturally confused OP, assuming you’re not American…?
Halloween is a nothing and not remotely like Easter or Christmas… suggest you step away from Instagram and take some deep breaths!

What on earth have I just read? Halloween a family time?

Whatever next! Family gatherings to celebrate the changing of the clocks?

Yes, the pumpkins and dressing up the outside of the house is definitely an American import. The festival of Halloween is not however as others have said.

As kids in the North in the 70s we would dress up as witches or ghosts and carry a turnip lantern. That was it really. I think we got money too and a few sweets!

The Halloween of 2024 is more commercialised than the Halloween I grew up with (I'm 40) - but so is Christmas, and Easter, and birthdays, and Valentines, and and and. I don't think we can blame the Americans for our commericialism. If it didn't sell, they wouldn't stock it.

Am so glad mine are too old for trick and treating didn't realise I might have to do it again in the future😄

I bet if you ask most children down South they won’t know what guising is about

Nor kids up north!

We had stinking turnip lanterns too in Yorkshire! Pumpkins didn't exist!

Ummmmmm I got that thanks? That's why I said might.

Even if it wasn't though why does American = Bad?

Even if it wasn't though why does American = Bad?

First rule of MN.

This, with pumpkins on!

The current iteration of Halloween and trick or treating is not a festival. It's a commercial opportunity that supermarkets and vendors of tat have grabbed onto to try and fill their coffers.

Mum has probably been going along with it for years thinking that the kids will have grown out of it soon, but no, even though at least one is now secondary age and plenty of enough to go out with his mate, she is 'selfish' for having other plans.

You want me to make the difference what does that mean?

Does it really matter where it came from? It's ridiculous anyway and no one would carve a turnip.

Turnips are carved.

How they're rock solid do you boil it first?

Yep.

I am in my 60s and Halloween wasn't really celebrated when I was a child. Bonfire night was the big one, with either large local displays or lots of neighbours having a few fireworks in their garden - or both on good years. We always had sausages and baked potatoes with lots of butter on Bonfire Night. Mom used margarine most of the time, but butter was bought for special occasions - birthdays, Christmas and Bonfire Night.

Somewhere over the last 50 years the onus has swapped.

That might be what your Halloween would be like, but it's not the case for everyone.

It's a family day in our house because we spend the morning picking and carving pumpkins, and then the afternoon baking and decorating cakes and biscuits.

I decorate my porch and my older children stay at home to welcome trick or treaters. I take the younger ones out after dark but we only stop at houses that want us too.

We watch a spooky family movie and then dp and I watch a scary movie or sit by the fire pit with mulled wine.

It's a lovely day for us. Not every festival must be connected to the Christian calendar.

Really? Most adults your mums age probably couldn't think of a worse evening, sure she’s done her time with trick or treating

i now want to try drilling a turnip, though I’ve never seen one bigger than a tomato so I’m not sure how good a lantern it would make. A pp did say swede, which would be a better size.

God no. You use a knife and/or a drill.

And there were no tealights back then either. You had to drip in a base of wax for an old fashioned candle, squidge it in and hope it was straight.

Turnips make good lanterns.

Yes you are. She wants to get her hair done and there’s nothing selfish about that. She’s not obliged to take part in events such as Halloween just because she’s a Nan. They’re your children - you do the Trick or Treating and movie night with them. I’m sure they won’t mind.

Family time where OP assigns granny to dress up and traipse the streets, escorting her 12 year old grandson and his friend trick or treating in the dark and the cold, while OP stays with the younger children.