Halloween

mildlygranola

Like most things this year, Halloween was weird. Our city allowed trick or treating, but with COVID cases rising and kids who forget to socially distance once excited and/or hopped up on sugar, we decided to skip it this year. Halloween is a big deal in our house, so we found other ways to make it fun.

In the Des Moines area trick or treating is done the night before Halloween and it is called Beggars Night. I am not from Des Moines, so I cannot tell you why this stupid tradition exists. I try not to talk about it as my husband gets really annoyed with me each year when I calmly explain to him how freaking asinine the tradition is (he grew up here). I’m only telling you this so you can understand the timeline of Halloween fun.

Last night I picked up a couple of fun pizza products from Aldi. They had mini margarita pizzas and jack o’lantern pizzas (with a butternut squash sauce and mascarpone cheese, yum!). The kids always love pizza for dinner, and giving them tiny pizza was a hit. The squash pizza was not a hit with them, but John and I both liked it.

We did not let the kids trick or treat in the neighborhood. We did, however, let them dress up from the costume trunk and trick our treat inside our house. The kids would knock on doors and get candy from John and I. We all had a good time. The kids were thrilled when we let them eat candy after trick or treating.

For Halloween today the kids decorated a chocolate cookie haunted house. I put the building together with a bit of help from Audrey, and then I let them decorate it. I didn’t try to make it pretty or have more of a theme or cohesive look (which was difficult for me). I let them have at it, and they had a lot of fun.

Tomorrow we will pack up the decorations and start thinking seriously about winter coming. For tonight I’m going to enjoy some tea and the fun of Halloween.

12 thoughts on “Halloween”

  3. Looks like a fun couple of nights! I remember having similar struggles when it came to decorating sugar cookies or the Christmas tree. Every time I had to remind myself to step back, and it was always worth it, but yeah, so hard. And now they don’t even want to decorate!!

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  4. That sounds like a wonderful Halloween! Beggar’s Night is an interesting tradition – now I’m curious. The town I grew up had Halloween on 10/31 no matter what. The city nearest to us had Halloween on the closest Saturday to the 31st, which was weird, but understandable. The pizza sound great, especially the squash one!

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  5. we had beggars night Sarah on the30th. IT was solely for houligans. Throwing eggs at houses and the like. I think you guys did a great job with in house trick or treating. I LOVE the gingerbread haunted house!! Nice job ! You made my Halloween fun.

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  6. It sounds like great alternate Halloween fun:) Beggar’s night sounds odd. The one plus I could see is being able to trick or treat another town Halloween night:) We have a traditional 10/31 Halloween here. There were fewer people out and about this year. The suggestion by locals was to place candy on a table and let people pick up what they wanted. This seemed to work out pretty well.

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  7. I know in Michigan when I au paired there is something on the 30th and basically the news had TPd houses and burnt out cars??? I don’t think they called it beggars night but something else. Anyway sounds like you had a good time and stayed safe.

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  8. We called the eve of Halloween “Mischief Night”. It was a night for bombing houses with toilet paper and shaving cream. I only participated in it once and it ruined my Halloween. In future years, I elected to stick with getting candy!

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