So, turns out that if you live where we do (in one of the few converted houses amongst mainly large family homes) then putting up halloween decorations indicates that you are *open* for trick or treaters. Who knew?
Not that we minded. We gave away all those horrid Bounty bars from the celebrations box I bought half price the other week. Still, once we'd given all the Snickers away and then all of the Mars Bars, I drew the line. I wasn't expecting the backlash though. One charming child, on being informed that he was in fact too late for chocolate, as it had all gone (which it had. I gave away some & had eaten the few remaining milkyways & malteasers), shouted "We have come all this way. You had better give us something" in a very menacing manner, much to the horror of the parent who was accompanying them (he explained to me the child was a friend of his son's). As he walked back through our front garden he shouted to Husband, visible through the kitchen window, that he "would remember our house & return to mess it up". He couldn't have been more than 7 or 8. How sad.
I was also sad to see that for most parents, costume making seems to involve going to a shop and purchasing one. I have never worn anything other than a handmade creation and do not intend to start now, whether we have children or not. One Mum clearly couldn't even run to a sheet for a ghost outfit, e-mailing this to our freecycle group last week:
"My little boy has been invited to a fancy dress party this Saturday. Was wondering if anyone had a boys fancy dress outfit that their child no longer needs. At present not to fussed what costume it is."
I don't know what the response rate was like but I should have responded that I had plenty of empty loo rolls in the recycling and lots of bubble wrap and that perhaps she & her son could create a monster outfit out of them. We always used to make our own fancy dress outfits for various school things and I can still clearly remember the feeling of immense satisfaction on creating myself a lantern out of black card in which I could carry a candle when dressing up as the original Guy Fawkes.
Satisfaction which almost rivalled that of the feeling I had last night after successfully retrieving Husband's phone which I had managed to flip down the back of the radiator in our bedroom. Having presumed that it would just fall out the bottom I was surprised to find that the skirting board makes a secure seal at the bottom meaning that the only way to get it out was the way it fell in. 45 minutes later and both of us suffering from neck-ache from peering down the very small gap, I had rigged up a greaseproof paper contraption and we managed to get the phone back using a bamboo cane. The phone was extremely dusty (which goes someway to explaining why our flat is always so dusty - it literally is collecting in great lumps back there with no way to remove it) but working.
And it is bonfire night this week. We are having a party with pumpkin whoopie pies, mulled wine, sparklers & s'mores (courtesy of our American guests) whilst we show them what a proper English autumn celebration is like. We may even have a 'bonfire' & apple bobbing...
(Post to come later in the week explaining why we celebrate this event, in case readers are unaware...)
Not that we minded. We gave away all those horrid Bounty bars from the celebrations box I bought half price the other week. Still, once we'd given all the Snickers away and then all of the Mars Bars, I drew the line. I wasn't expecting the backlash though. One charming child, on being informed that he was in fact too late for chocolate, as it had all gone (which it had. I gave away some & had eaten the few remaining milkyways & malteasers), shouted "We have come all this way. You had better give us something" in a very menacing manner, much to the horror of the parent who was accompanying them (he explained to me the child was a friend of his son's). As he walked back through our front garden he shouted to Husband, visible through the kitchen window, that he "would remember our house & return to mess it up". He couldn't have been more than 7 or 8. How sad.
I was also sad to see that for most parents, costume making seems to involve going to a shop and purchasing one. I have never worn anything other than a handmade creation and do not intend to start now, whether we have children or not. One Mum clearly couldn't even run to a sheet for a ghost outfit, e-mailing this to our freecycle group last week:
"My little boy has been invited to a fancy dress party this Saturday. Was wondering if anyone had a boys fancy dress outfit that their child no longer needs. At present not to fussed what costume it is."
I don't know what the response rate was like but I should have responded that I had plenty of empty loo rolls in the recycling and lots of bubble wrap and that perhaps she & her son could create a monster outfit out of them. We always used to make our own fancy dress outfits for various school things and I can still clearly remember the feeling of immense satisfaction on creating myself a lantern out of black card in which I could carry a candle when dressing up as the original Guy Fawkes.
Satisfaction which almost rivalled that of the feeling I had last night after successfully retrieving Husband's phone which I had managed to flip down the back of the radiator in our bedroom. Having presumed that it would just fall out the bottom I was surprised to find that the skirting board makes a secure seal at the bottom meaning that the only way to get it out was the way it fell in. 45 minutes later and both of us suffering from neck-ache from peering down the very small gap, I had rigged up a greaseproof paper contraption and we managed to get the phone back using a bamboo cane. The phone was extremely dusty (which goes someway to explaining why our flat is always so dusty - it literally is collecting in great lumps back there with no way to remove it) but working.
And it is bonfire night this week. We are having a party with pumpkin whoopie pies, mulled wine, sparklers & s'mores (courtesy of our American guests) whilst we show them what a proper English autumn celebration is like. We may even have a 'bonfire' & apple bobbing...
(Post to come later in the week explaining why we celebrate this event, in case readers are unaware...)
