Thread: Question for those of you with young children.

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I have always stayed home while my wife brings the kids around. Everybody comes to our house after trick or treating anyways and I get all the stories. Early on I would take the kids on our street , 8 houses, and have fun with nobody watching the store.
Besides, my kids are 10,12 and 14 and would run me into the ground during their quest for the most candy ever so even if I wanted to go now I'd be out of luck.

I stayed home last year for the first time.
It was also the first time I ever setup a good Haunt.
I didn't want it destroyed.

You can't always get what you want, sometimes you have to sacrifice.

Oddly enough, I never saw and joy on my kids faces while tot.....perhaps due to the masks?

Except for me and one other house no one really decorates.
They do talk about the compliments they got on their costumes though.
That's probably the only "thrill" they get on Halloween.

We generally have everything about set up--and hubbie and I run our little guy around for an hour while it's still a bit light out. 'The Help' will stay @ the house and man the grounds and do the last minute touches until we return just as it's getting dark-enough to be 'good'.

Everything is so rushed ....it goes by too quickly....We love TOT'ing with him as we hear lots of things about what we've done each year...and the 'big kids' tell us how much they can't wait to come by. Of course we go in full costume ..it's a hoot! My son always tells them about the 'new' things we have...he gets soo excited.

I hope he can stay as excited about it as we do....

I have the same problem!
This year will be an experiement. My hubby said he would take our kid TOTing! (He doesn't answer the door when he stays home )

So far I have been the one to take our kid TOTing, and as far as I can tell by trying to view it from wherever we are in the neighborhood, no kids stop there.
This year I will stay home for candy duty and keeping lights/sounds up, and see if I can get some TOTers to stop by.

If you don't have anyone to help you, I would suggest set up for TOT's, take your kid out, come back for a candy/potty break and hopefully get to hand out a few candies, then go back out. Your kid will get to do both and might let you know what they want to do next time.

Not sure I should comment....I don't do a haunt....but Even before my kids could walk or talk... I took them TOTing. It was great fun to see their eyes light up...something that won't last long...so enjoy it while you can..the haunt will always be there. Get someone to watch your haunt and had out candy while your kids are young enough to enjoy halloween with you. it won't last long. These are moments that they will always remember...even when they are old and gray. and the feeling you get doing it with them is priceless.

This is what I did and I am a single dad. Had the haunt set up . Gave TOT's treats for 2 hours. Asked a neighbor to comeover and hand out while I took him TOTing for his first time.Came home put him to bed and gave out treats.

Then when it was all over I took my ENTIRE haunt down leaving it as if nothing happened. The neighborhood awoke to my house back to normal again.

My Ex took custody of our two little boys, as Mothers do. I had every other weekend from 9 am Sat. to 5pm Sun. at the same time I usually had to work to make the child support. I had been a very involved Father spending lot of time with them at all odd moments and times, I saw them in the morning, at lunchtime, suppertime, I was on-call but never more than a few minutes from them.
Her insecurity and grip on them increased as they became older, as I never missed a week's support in all of those 10 & 11 years.
My youngest son loved the haunted house, my other boys didn't much care for it, this was OK, I believe in allowing personal choices to advance personal happiness for everyone.
Building and operating a year-round haunted attraction took almost my every waking moment and energy and doing this for my living was about the only opportunity I had here unless I wanted to be a wage-slave for min. wage, which really does not pay one's way in life as far as I can tell unless you have no problem living with your hand out , hoping the Gov. or someone will provide for you and yours...
Sometimes all one has left is your dignity and a little false pride, give up those and you have nothing , especially in a small town where everybody knows everything.(And you don't have the money to move away!)
I have regrets about missing their childhood. I hope they understand as they are now adults with expectations from the real world upon their shoulders. They may have been "Halloweened" to death what with my work in this house pretty much 24/7/365.
Alot of "fun" loses it's draw when it becomes work... and work is perpetual.. at least the once again hungry stomach tells us it's like this.

The kids don't usually trick-or-treat to long. Once we have the yard setup, we get the kids ready. Usually stopping to hand out candy in the process. Before we head out we put the big cauldron of candy on display on the front porch. We trick-or-treat in our subdivision and are just walking around the neighborhood. Our house can been seen throughout the subdivision and we are never really to far away. Most of the props are static and the rest are on timers. Since my kids are big help with the ideas and props and setup, after they get enough candy they usually want to head back to the yard and show their friends what they did. They are proud of their haunt and always have ideas for next year. To them, trick-or-treating is like research for what we need to do to make it better.