Are you still hiding from Halloween?

As a family, for years, we avoided Halloween almost entirely. We made the deliberate choice not to get involved with things like Light Parties and, when we moved to our small village, our young children were very content to either just let me answer the door to the many trick or treaters (given the size of our village we have a disproportionately large number) or we would leave treats at the door and go out.

Although most children dressed up cute, we had some local teens who enjoyed dressing up as scarily as they could and my children became quite 'anti' everything Halloween.

Then we saw a Facebook post by Nay Dawson about what her family did in 2020 and our life switched! The following year we made our house a House of Light. We decorated the house, went all out on treat bags with heart and spider sweets, glowsticks and Nay's spider story handout (we made 50 and ran out!).

Almost every family that came mentioned something about it and we received messages in the following days from a couple of parents who said having something bright and light made a nice change.

The next year we upped the ante: my husband and daughter made intricately carved pumpkins with references to hope and love, made a willow woven archway with hidden toy animals for children to find as they walked through (including a couple of very cute bats) and (again) treat bags with sweets and a story.

The third year was the same again, I wrote my own story this time and my daughter and I created a story/puzzle leaflet. Again, the house and treat bags were themed to match. One father, as he arrived, said he had been looking forward to our house for a month as he so appreciated the hope amongst the darkness for his little boy to see. Last year over 70 bags were handed out and I actively look forward to working out this year's theme!

Our whole family gets involved now (last year one of my sons asked if he could hand the treats out) and having been the 'lights off, avoid' family we are now thrilled to be bringing some joy and hopefulness - fuelled by our knowledge of the joy and hope we have in Christ - into a dark, and sometimes scary, place. Knowing it is impacting even one or two people has been thrilling, and we will keep going as long as children keep ringing the doorbell!

Passion for Evangelism are running a Halloween workshop this September. For more information visit: https://www.pfe-women.co.uk/autumnevents