We moved into a new tract 29 years ago. As the houses sold very slowly, we had several years of a few kids gradually increasing. Then we hit the big time and got about 200 for a few years. Now the kids are grown and gone, and we were lucky to have about 8 this year. During the busy years, we were the close together houses in a large track with no big streets that people across town drove to with their kids. Now I understand they go across our little town to the richest neighborhood around, and it is so crowded for the full size candy bars, etc.

There will be less than 10 kids that are of "true trick or treating age," then there about about 50 kids who are juniors or seniors in high school, or older.

I know a lot of folks here at the table don't see anything wrong with 17- and 18-year-olds (and older) going around trick or treating for candy, but that's not how I was raised, and my personal opinion is that it's just not right.

I had at least 70 kids, so candy is all gone except for a small bowl I put aside with some favorites. The kids are always so polite and cute!

We got *0*. Nada. None.

We live in an apt. complex, on the third floor. Kids don't want to climb stairs.

We had candy just in case, so we took turns going out, knocking on the door and saying "trick or treat". LoL

We had the yard more decorated than usual so we had more than the usual amount. And the late comers were teens. Which I am happy to give to, as they are polite and enjoy dressing up and some of the costumes are pretty neat. Some are kind of hesitant, as I am sure that at other places they have been rebuffed. But I would rather have them dress up, act silly and got for treats than do the egg or toilet paper deal. And even the big fellows seem to have a good time. And they are so thrilled if you talk to them about their costumes, especially the home made ones. Our town did not have any type of function for the young or old as far as celebrating the holiday, which is a pity. As when I was young, they had contests and parties for the little ones and dances for the older ones. But that is gone, so I always make sure that big or little, we will greet them and give treats, as it is fun on both ends, as some of the costumes are very good. And we love the homemade ones.

The last few years we have had zero. I sure miss the kids come knocking. I loved seeing their costumes. We live in the country, so I know they take the kids into the little town where they can just walk from house to house. I always thought the ones that went trick or treating in the country got the better treats, bigger candy bars and more of them. I know we did when we were kids.
We grew up in the country and my parents would have never thought of taking us into "town" for this. We went to our neighbors in the country.

w

This year they did Trunk or Treat in the park on the other side of town. It's a rural area so that gave folks who live outside of town to bring treats to kids. I don't know how many people showed up. I thought it might cut down on the number of T&Ters we saw but we still seemed to have a decent amount. I'm not sure how many we had (DH and Nick were manning the bowl). I'd say between 50-75 which is good for us.

My sister lives in a ritzy development, but not a huge development. She had about 250. People were asking for directions to get back to their cars because they didn't know the neighborhood - they just came for the good loot. One little girl got upset because they came to my sister's house twice. She told her dad that they were lost and going in circles! My sister is used to it but it would bug me.

I had about 30, which is usual for me. But I always buy enough candy to give each kid 2 or 3 pieces (the little bars). They think that's cool, and I enjoy interacting with them. And they are always polite, nice kids. Some are more shy than others. I kind of with I had more kids come, like it was when I was a kid. But I'm not disappointed, because it's been consistent since I've lived here, for about the past 10 years

The last group was 4 boys, probably around 14. They didn't even have costumes! Well, one boy had colored, lightup teeth. I still joked with them (teased them about the lack of costumes/effort). They were fun and nice boys. They joked back, trying to make up things that they were supposed to be (one said a junior high school student!). And I'd rather be known in the area as a fun person than a crank, as a couple of my neighbors are! :-)

S

We ended up not turning the light on, and didn't put any decorations out either. Thus, nada, no trick or treaters.

Jerry has a spider bite that got really sore (yes he was at the DR's but won't find out anything till Monday), and thus didn't want to do anything.

Since I hadn't gotten any candy yet, we just left the lights out.

Besides, I was tired. I had dug out a lot of bermuda grass, and planted several of my plants I had bought at Lowes.

Moni

Last year I ran out of candy and wound up dipping in my stash of Dove chocolates. So this year I figured I'd buy extra. I wound up with 5 left over bags. We have a lot of young families in our neighborhood and the one behind us also and got a lot from there last year. Don't know why the crowd was smaller this year.

One thing that really annoyed me is one little snot. He and his sister showed up, I put a candy bar into each bag and then he shook his bag again. I told him only one and then he said "Ha! I was here before so I got twice the candy." He then shook (yes shook) his backside to me and ran off. I know it wasn't right, but I hollered after him that I hoped he got an upset stomach from the candy. The really annoying part was that his parents were at the end of the driveway! They knew they had been here before. What kid of lesson are they teaching the kid when he behaves like that?

I think next year I'll just leave the lights off and not even bother.

I had to work Halloween night and Alex said he didn't want to hand out candy, so I didn't buy any. Been sick and didn't hang any decorations either. Lauren went around the neighborhood with a bunch of her friends. She's 12 and so are most of her friends. Her best friend is 13 and went even though the cut off is 12.

She said she was told by at least one adult that they were too old to trick or treat. How do they know? After I got off work, Lauren's best friend and two of the boys came over to wait on one of the boy's father's to pick the boys up and they sure didn't look older than 12.

I was surprised. We live in a neighborhood of 300 homes. Half of which contain children. We have always had at least 50 children in the past. This year....maybe 12!! I have all these Reese's and Jr. Mints left. We're not candy eaters. What a waste of money this year. Where was everyone? The weather was perfect for being outside. There weren't any big parties advertised for people to go to.
It would be fine with me if neighborhood canvasing stopped, on Halloween night. I wouldn't miss it.

We had three neighbor kids came and they were really early. I wish I had given them all of the candy!

Some lady brought her 2 BIG kids out in a car, with fabric grocery bags almost full, and smirked that they had been "everwhere". We are 6 miles out from town with less than 12 homes, so I can't imagine why she came out this far!

Next year we are going to take candy to the neighbor kids after dinner, and then turn out the lights.

I told DH I am going over to neighbor kids today and giving them all the candy we have left, which is a lot! Kathy

We were prepared but only had 6 kids come to our door. All little ones and no teens this year. We were expecting a few more than that since the weather was nice and it was not a school night. Now we have tons of leftovers.

We had very few kids, most of them came during daylight. I gave out 33 candy bars and 7 packs of gum. I had a little left, one gum and one candy bar. It was okay. No pranks. Once I found shaving cream in my mailbox and on my car. Nothing like that this year. I'm glad it's over.

Well, we were in Va. looking at the house we are moving into on base. There was probably 50 kids that knocked on our door. I finally had to tape a note on the door that "We didnt have any candy, sorry". In fact, we didn't have anything in the house. We have to pack up our stuff in NC and haul it up. LOL There were at least 100 to 125 kids in the complex trick or treating. At least I know next year to have plenty of candy on hand.
Susan :)

Zero in my neck of the woods!

Disapointed here too :( A few little ones came by and 10 or so high schoolers. The older ones don't even dress up and sadly, were lacking manners. In fact one was on his cell phone and never acknowledged me...very rude.

I have 4 bags of candy left and I'm sure I will find some use for them LOL

For the first time ever we had no trick-or-treaters.

:-( (sigh)

Oh, well -- all the more candy for the two of us.

I'm so sorry your Halloween was dissapointing. We enjoyed every minute of ours. We have had few T or Trs and I can appreciate that. I have a party every year and all the kids in the neighborhod come and go most of the evening. After 9:30 to 10:00 PM most of the kids are home and the adults sit around the bon fire in wonderful fellowship. It has become tradition here for a potluck dinner to be served until late late and we finally said good night to the last of the guests about 3:00AM All the costumes were just fabulous. Maybe you should try somethng like ours or a block party.
CT

We had about 8 this year up from 0 last year..DD age 16 and her friend dressed up and took the friends little sisters and brother out trick or treating..

At the first house a lady yelled that they were TOO OLD to be out t/t...I told DD that she should have said...Yep we are too old to be out but they are too young to be out on their own....

littlebit

We did not have many, because we are on the edge of town and because it is a duplex, many do not know that two families live here which is fine with me.
Just a note: left over candy can be frozen or given to food pantrys. Also years ago in CA we had so many teens and I knew most of them from volunteering at the HS, I started a tradition. They had to do a "trick" to get a treat--anything, sing, do a short poem, dance etc. First year was a riot but after that they really looked forward to it. They really did some crazy stuff and had a ball. Had more teens than little ones and when we moved they were really disapponted.

I worked but DH maintained the t&t's. The way the candy looked when I got home,
I can say he had some t&t's. There were two bags leftover which I stuck in the freezer
for a later time then there was a half a bag left which I took to work to let the customers enoy!!!
I do like the idea of the trunk party also the block party, but my neighborhood would not go for anything like that.
Deb

We had about 90 this year which was up a little bit. I figured it would be up since it was warm and there was no school the next day. We probably would have had much more had I put out the decorations. I just turned on the lights and that was it. All the kids we had were polite this year. I was happy to see that and every group of kids had some adult supervision which I was really happy to see.

We had our usual few shows. The interest has been dropping over the years even though there is an ample supply of children near our house. 15 years ago, we had an opposite problem: professional visitors! There were a few familes from a large city one county away who 'raided' the better suburbs for candy and treats. It was the accompaning adult's goal to collect as much loot as possible, then take it home to meter it out in lunches or fence the goods in their neignborhood.

We did have a cute pair of boys, possibly a brother team. One was dressed as a gangster. He held a toy gun to his smaller partner's head and said, "Give us candy or he gets it!"

We live in a neighborhood that ususally gets mobbed by at least a couple of hundred kids. There weren't nearly as many kids trick or treating this year. I'd say over half of the houses weren't handing out candy this year either. The kids still made out like bandits. I even got a few pieces from people because I was dressed up too. We had lots of fun.

We're in a semi-rural area with lots between 1.5 and 7 acres. We're at the end of one dead-end road.

We do a neighborhood hay-ride trick-or-treat. 3 or 4 trucks hauling trailers with hay bales, each with 10-15 kids and the requisite adult riders, who also usually dress in costumes.

My DH drives one, but there is no room at the end of our road for the trailers to turn around. I send treats with him, but I never see the little costumed people. I stay home and herd the cats and dogs. The animals do get a little freaky with all the activity.