You might be too old to go trick-or-treating, but you’re not too old to have fun on Halloween.
No one is too old to have fun on Halloween.
Still, though, you’re personally done with trick-or-treating. The first thing we recommend – if you want to go trick-or-treating but feel weird about it because you’re sixteen or seventeen – is to chaperone younger siblings or maybe help neighborhood parents by chaperoning their young kids. That way, you can have all the fun you used to have and it won’t be weird or inappropriate at all.
If that’s not an option, consider these:
- Go to a haunted house. Get your parents to take you to one of those super-scary ones that come through town every year. Or get a group of friends together and have your parents drop you off. It will be fun, and you get to find out who, in your friend group, is startle-icious. Then you can have fun spooking them year-round. No, don’t do that – but we’re just saying you could, theoretically.
- Make a haunted house of your own. Find the friend in your group of peers who has a big basement, a usable attic, or has parents that don’t mind a group of teens turning their entire house into El Casa de Yikes! for one night.
- Have a costume party. It doesn’t have to be a full-on haunted house. But you can invite a group of friends over and have a costume contest, a pumpkin-carving contest, or do fun activities on a Halloween theme.
- Have a scary movie marathon. Invite your friends over and watch all the scariest movies you can think of – with parental approval, of course. Halloween movies range all the way from those that are appropriate for first-graders to those that scare most adults half to death. Choose wisely, get ready to scream, and have plenty of popcorn ready.
- Be The Coolest House on the Block. You don’t have to hold a full-on haunted house. But you can participate in the neighborhood fun by holding down the fort and handing out the candy. You can decorate the yard, your porch, and even dress up in costume. And on the night itself, all you have to do is chill at home, and wait for the kids to show up. Throw on that zombie mask, give the little ones a scare, then give them candy. And then wait for the next group.
You may be too old to go trick-or-treating, but you are most definitely not too old to have fun on the spookiest night of the year. And if you think you’re way to cool for all that – well then there’s nothing we can do for you. Except wish you a pleasant evening entirely devoid of anything Ghoulicous or Spooktacular.