Trick-or-treat sure is different than it used to be.

[bandgeek]

We live in a lower-income neighborhood with a LOT of kids...almost every house has at least one. My dad told me he was sure it would be swarming with ToTers so I bought $15 of the good candy (no smarties and dubble bubble here!) and I'm hardly getting any ToTers! I even sat on the porch waiting and they come only every 15 minutes or so. I got cold though, so I'm staying in now.

I'm one of 3 houses on our block who is actually passing out candy. Everyone else turns off their porch lights, loads the kids up in the car, and takes them to a not-so-poor neightborhood to ToT.

The only kids I've gotten were on their way back from the other neighborhoods. They just drop by before going home. And the worst part is, I've seen 4 cars just loaded wtih kids as young as infants. Not one car seat or anything. One car had 7 kids in it and the youngest looked about 8 months and was riding on his mom's (?) lap in the front passenger seat. This seems to just be the way it's done here. I've heard a few sirens already (which is rare in our small town). I'm hoping not to see any bad news in the paper tomorrow. :

[boobear]

With all the kids in our neighborhood I thought we'd get a bunch more but, sadly, they all to into town for candy. It's the "thing" around here, the main part of town (shops and homes) decorate and hand out candy. But I've heard it gets so crowded that kids wait on line at each place to "trick or treat". I walked my little ones around our quiet neighborhood and they loved it. All the homes we stopped at were so happy to see some kids! And few were well decorated to spook the kids. It's a shame they're all driven to town, I live in such a great little neighborhood!

[root*children]

I think that's weird, too, but it was going on when I was a kid, so I don't things things have really changed. There were *good* neighborhoods (rich) that everyone wanted to go to. A family we went with tonight saw the lack of ToT'ers on our street, and said she didn't think people really went ToT'ing anymore... HA! just not on my street! Oh well, we went on my street, and sure, not many folks were giving out candy (about half the ToT'ers were being driven around), but it was all good candy, and you've got to support your own neighborhood and have some community spirit, you know? I'm also just a dorky neighborhood-community-spirit kinda gal

[Ambrose]

In our area most of the people either go to other neighborhoods, or to church or any indoor hosted thing for kids. It bums DH and me out... as we remember running from house to house yelling trick or treat and having FUN outside. I just don't see the fun indoors going from table to table to get candies and then maybe play some games....


Even toting in apartments complexes would be cool to me. But no one dies that around here either. I only got two treaters at the apartment tonight.

[nonnymoose]

You should come to our neighborhood. We barely got anyone the first few years I was here, but it changed in 2001 - don't know if the terrorist attacks were what did it, but that was the year ToT came back to my street! I can go through two huge bags of candy in four hours. The neighborhood isn't particularly upscale, but it is safe, and the houses are fairly close together. I'm pretty sure people come here from all over because the way the streets are laid out - it's an easy walk for a couple hours of ToT. There're some lower-income apartments a couple of blocks away, and all those kids come through, as well as the ones who live here. I see people bringing vanloads of children in from...well, from somewhere. I don't care where they came from, as long as they say "thank you," and at least make an effort at a costume.
I missed ToT this year, because I'm at work tonight. I'd set out a huge bowl of candy by the front door before I left, so DH wouldn't have to think about that along with the two little boys, but the littler one decided to fall asleep at 6:30 and DH turned off the lights.
Anyone want about five pounds of Willy Wonka candy?

[Flor]

It's a vicious cycle. I don't know how it starts, but the first year we moved here, we tried to ToT here, but there was hardly any houses with their lights one, so the next year, we went to gma's neighborhood, which left our house one of those dark houses. I wish someone (ugh, not me) in our neighborhood would organize, publicize. . .we promise to ToT here if you all promise to turn on your lights!

[bandgeek]

Originally Posted by Flor

It's a vicious cycle. I don't know how it starts, but the first year we moved here, we tried to ToT here, but there was hardly any houses with their lights one, so the next year, we went to gma's neighborhood, which left our house one of those dark houses. I wish someone (ugh, not me) in our neighborhood would organize, publicize. . .we promise to ToT here if you all promise to turn on your lights!

That's what I thought...it was just a vicious cycle to the point that almost no one ToT's here. DH took DS out and got loads of candy though, they were just out for a long time and covered a large area. Plus, a lot of the houses didn't get many ToT'ers, so they'd give DS like 2 handfuls of candy.

When they came back, I told DH about the cars loaded with kids and he didn't think it was too big of a deal since they were all going like 5 miles an hour with their hazard lights on. I felt a little better about that...until we stopped by burger king for a quick bite to eat and saw the family that had the 7 kids in the car. They didn't stay in the neighborhoods. They took all those kids onto the main highway (45 mph speed limit) to eat at BK. And I got a better look at the baby and he was only about 4 or 5 months (he was big, but obviously younger than I originally thought).

[lalaland42]

We went to the mall to ToT this year but we will do the neighborhood when DD is a little older and will actually *wear* a costume. At least DH wore DD's tiara.

Does anyone remember hearing the urban legends on halloween about the rich neighbors giving out full size candy bars? All I remember is these supposed rich people were always two blocks away.

[Ceili]

My parent's used to give out full sized candy bars. I'm not sure if they still do, but they definitely did when I was in high school. Though we lived in a small neighborhood and we usually only gave them to the kids that lived there, the ones that were being bused in got something different.

I like to trick or treat in my own neighborhood. Here our homeowner's associations passes out Ghost pictures that you put in your window if you're giving out candy. When you're out of candy, you take down your ghost.

In the past we've gone to friend's neighborhoods because where we were living wasn't really safe, not because of crime or anything like that, but because there weren't any street lights or sidewalks and the houses are set back far from the road. I've never gone looking for a "rich" neighborhood, just one where the roads are straight, the houses are closer together and well lit.

[Yooper]

It was very very cold here this year. It was disheartening because we did not get nearly as many trick or treaters as normal and I could only take dd around the block before the numbness set in.

What bugged me this year was all of the parents sitting in thier cars at idle follwing their kids around because they were too lazy to get out and walk with their kids. I understand some might be disabled or sick or something, but it was LOTS of cars. It was very nervewracking fo me since we do not have sidewalks or very good street lighting. I was just sure someone was going to get run over.

[mamabohl]

oh how scary about the kids piling in the vans!

Even though our basing housing is full of kids there wasn't much trick-or-treating. It seems to be normal here to sit in your driveway, they won't come up to your house (even if your lights on...wierd). Plus only a few houses on every street were passing out. Most people walked or got in the car and drove to the base church, it has this huge festival every Halloween night that is so fun! The boys had fun playing and didn't get so much candy, hehe.

[RedWine]

We live in a mixed neighborhood, in an urban environment. We always get trick-or-treaters! I'd say about 60-70 individual people came last night. The rule here is that if the porch light is not on or if there are no other signs of Halloween (lighted jack-o-lanterns, spooky lights, etc.) then you don't stop by the house. On our street, probably 2 out of 3 had their lights on. We went down 3 streets and the kids got a truckload of candy.

[wednesday]

It kind of stinks to be one of those "rich" neighborhoods, IMO. We live in a modest downtown neighborhood that gets a fair share of ToT-ers, but we usually poop out kind of early and head over to grandmom and granddad's house by about 7 to wind down and just pass out candy for the next hour or two. GM & GD love to see DS come ToT at their door in his costume. But every year it is harder to get through the neighborhood to their house because of all the people ToT-ing by car. Seriously...they will pull their van or car up to a house, the kids all run out and up to the door to get their candy, then run back to the car, which slowly coasts up to the next house. Take a couple dozen cars doing this--on top of the groups of kids and parents actually walking--and the streets, which are narrow and windy to begin with, get totally choked up. Besides the difficulty it makes for people wanting to actually drive through the neighborhood, it seems to create a very hazardous situation.

I don't have anything against people getting in the car and driving to a neighborhood that has better ToT-ing. But park the darn car and WALK with your kids.

We also have a downtown thing where all the merchants hand out candy on the sidewalk, but the candy was REALLY lame. Almost all of them were giving out like one little piece of off-brand bubble gum, or something like that. It was a LOT of walking around for a small amount of not-that-great candy. Next year I think we'll stay in our own neighborhood because walking up and down all those blocks of Main Street, and then back home (4 blocks away) really wore us all out, before we even got to the good ToT-ing.

[Mama Poot]

We didn't get any kids because we live on a corner lot with no sidewalks and my light was turned off My town, as I discovered, is HALLOWEEN HEAVEN! Everyone and their MOM comes here to TOT! And there's a big town party and parade and holy CRAP you have NEVER seen that many kids in the street- anywhere! I had an appointment at 5:30 and TOT started at 4, and the sidewalks were jammed with people like in NYC. Little podunk Sebring Ohio is Halloween central I'm sorry your neighborhood isn't as festive....however I also found out that most of the kids that came here were up the road from Alliance, most of which isn't very nice and there is crime.

[moonfirefaery]

I'm in a decent neighborhood and hardly see any kids TOT. This year very few people handed out candy, and I only had 2 TOT.

[taz925]

We had three sets of kids come to our door. It makes me sad. The ones that come are so cute and we enjoy giving out the candy. We went to maybe 10 houses that we could walk to. Some houses were dark but hey they are out just like us, DH was home to give out candy. Some had bowls out with a sign, please take one and Happy Halloween.

[Hippiemommie]

[QUOTE=bandgeek;6415771]We live in a lower-income neighborhood with a LOT of kids...almost every house has at least one. My dad told me he was sure it would be swarming with ToTers so I bought $15 of the good candy (no smarties and dubble bubble here!) and I'm hardly getting any ToTers! I even sat on the porch waiting and they come only every 15 minutes or so. I got cold though, so I'm staying in now.

I'm one of 3 houses on our block who is actually passing out candy. Everyone else turns off their porch lights, loads the kids up in the car, and takes them to a not-so-poor neightborhood to ToT.
QUOTE]


We went Trick or Treating in one of the wealthier neighborhoods last night (with SIL) and it was horrible. Now I'm not a candy snob but they were giving out Tootsie rolls and one a piece after you walk up their HUGE driveway and it is forever in between houses. I told DH and SIL that we needed to go to the regular houses in the lower income neighborhood that we are from. Sure enough, the houses were decorated. The people had their lights on, were dressed up, and were handing out the good stuff.

[raleigh_mom]

They pile into their cars and head for our neighborhood. We have lots of families living here, too. So, our total remains around 200 kids each year.

[WNB]

We got one little kid dressed up as Pooh last night - and he was really little, so I'm thinking that it was more for Mom and Dad's fun (and sweet tooth) than anything.

There are a few other ToT-age kids on our block, and a bunch on the next street down - I was hoping they'd come by but oh well.

How sad is it for kids to get toted around in a car collecting tons of candy. I'm having a hard time getting the image of Cartman from Southpark out of my head. At least they could get a little bit of exercise on the night they chow down on so much sugar (but that would require the parents to get the exercise too!).

[Mama Poot]

Originally Posted by Hippiemommie

We went Trick or Treating in one of the wealthier neighborhoods last night (with SIL) and it was horrible. Now I'm not a candy snob but they were giving out Tootsie rolls and one a piece after you walk up their HUGE driveway and it is forever in between houses. I told DH and SIL that we needed to go to the regular houses in the lower income neighborhood that we are from. Sure enough, the houses were decorated. The people had their lights on, were dressed up, and were handing out the good stuff.

I think its kinda funny no one's figured this out- Rich people are rich because they DON'T SPEND MONEY! Almost every wealthy person I've ever met skimps on the tiniest things. I had a rather well to do friend in high school and found it amusing that they bought Brand X scratchy as heck toilet paper and didn't drive fancy cars So I'm not surprised that you don't get the "good" candy when you go to the rich neighborhoods.