Join our family of curious Kansas Citians
Discover unheard stories about Kansas City, every Thursday.
Thank you for subscribing!
Check your inbox, you should see something from us.
Published October 30th, 2020 at 6:00 AM
Above image credit: Halloween festivities aren't completely canceled because of the pandemic. Here are a few creative ways to still indulge in the spooky season. (Adobe Stock)Halloween looks a bit different this year.
Instead of crowds of children in costumes ringing doorbells, welcomed by neighbors with a bowl of candy ready to drop in the kids’ little plastic buckets, people are reimagining ways to safely celebrate.
According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, the key is to avoid direct contact with trick-or-treaters. It seems this has families on Facebook, Nextdoor and Reddit asking around: “How are you doing Halloween this year?”
For Kansas City-based parents Ronnie and Melissa Porter, creative was the way to go to celebrate with their four small children.
Melissa said that their kids have been handling quarantine well. All four children are homeschooled, so their lives didn’t change drastically when things shut down. However, they noticed their friends starting to take part in seasonal festivities such as Halloween and wanted to join in on the fun. Ronnie and Melissa started to think about ways they celebrate safely.
They also participated in a “trunk-or-treat” at Midtown Baptist Temple where the kids were able to dress up and collect candy from masked and gloved volunteers.
“It was indoors and we all socially distanced, but they were still able to participate without doing the full gamut,” Ronnie said.
In addition to pumpkin carving at home and trick-or-treating in a controlled environment, Melissa said they’re having the kids help them with decorating the house.
On Halloween night, rather than go door- to-door, the Porter family is opting to dress up at home and find a way to pass out candy while limiting contact with trick-or-treaters. They plan on having all the kids masked and gloved to hand out individual portions of candy.
“Every holiday is what the family makes it,” Ronnie said.
“Halloween for my family, this year, is going to be different, but not difficult. And I said ‘different’ because we thought that it is our responsibility to keep our community members safe. We will have stick-treats outside of our house. Literally, the idea of this is to attach candy to sticks. Then put those sticks into the ground. This way, it’s safe, socially distanced, and still fun for the kids and the adults, as well.”
Carmen toma, lawrence resident on keepinng halloween alive and safe in a pandemic
Catherine Hoffman reports on community and culture for Kansas City PBS in cooperation with Report for America.
