Halloween Past

I had a rather boring Halloween. Jim had to go to the church for Trunk or Treat and I had to stay behind to hand out candy to the neighborhood kids. We usually get some cute little ones but this year we only got big teenagers. Their bags were already half full and they weren't even nice. After awhile I just turned off the lights. The only highlight was when Susann came by with the kids. Even Betty Boop got excited to see them.

It made me remember the Halloweens in the past. I used to love Halloween as a kid. Our costumes were never store bought. I was a ghost (a bed sheet with 2 holes cut in it for eyes); a pirate (ragged jeans, a bandanna, junk necklaces, eye patch made from electrician tape); a princess (a prom dress purchased from Goodwill, no crown) and the most common-the hobo (similar to pirate but no necklace or eye patch and the bandanna now tied to a stick for a ruck sack). The school always had a costume judging contest, never won it. Didn't care.

Everyone wore their costume to school that day and we ended school early for the Halloween carnival. I went to Central School and they would set the carnival up in the street by the playground. The school was set up with lots of booths to win things. Each booth would have a game, like fishing, ring toss, knock down the bottles, etc. The prize was a cheap plastic toy like a spider ring. It seemed everyone got a prize. You had to buy a ticket to play, they were a nickel apiece. We usually got a dollar to buy tickets and I always was watching the ground for lost tickets I could grab.

I spent half my tickets on the booths and half on the cake walk. I wanted to win a cake so bad. Each year I would walk round and round and when the music stopped they would call out a number and the winner got a cake. It was NEVER mine! I never won but every year I kept trying. I loved it anyway.

They had chili and Kool-aid which was free, but you had to buy anything else. Since it was cafeteria food, we didn't eat much. We were too excited for the rest of the evening. Trick or Treating. We started at our house and went to Nana and Gramps collecting goodies along the way. We mostly were given penny candy, but one time I got a candy bar. No one else got it - just me! I was so excited. Sometimes people gave out pennies or nickles when they ran out of candy, that was also very good.

We ate so much candy we were sick for days. But loved every minute of it.