The lights are OFF

[twowhat?]

Stop ringing the doorbell. Seriously. I even turned off all the interior lights at the front of the house. STOP RINGING THE DOORBELL.

[LMPC]

Ding dong!!!!

(Sorry, couldn't resist!)

[Liziz]

Leave a sign outside that says "take some!" with an empty bowl....no doorbell ringing!

[lalasmama]

Oh my goodness, soooo there with you right now!

ALL the lights are off outside. Mind you, it's dark here, so there wasn't a "are they or aren't they on?" kind of middle spot. They had to walk VERY carefully down 3 steps, back up another step... to a dark, undecorated house.

And then there's a pounding on the door. Not a kid knock, but a hard pounding on the door. Seriously, like 8 seconds of "boom! boom! boom! boom! boom! boom!" on the door. And then, after about 15 seconds, I hear a man's voice say, "They're taking too long!" and off they went to pound on my neighbor's door, with the same results.

[crl]

I know. Isn't this universal?!? What is confusing about it?

Catherine

[LMPC]

It's the allure of candy....makes people crazy!

[TwinFoxes]

Leave a sign outside that says "take some!" with an empty bowl....no doorbell ringing!

People like that would take the bowl! :shake: Sorry OP, that sucks.

[twowhat?]

People like that would take the bowl! :shake: Sorry OP, that sucks.

I know! When our 3 bowls were empty, kids kicked them all over the yard. So irritating to see how rude kids are...bowling over younger kids to get to the door, banging on doors and then banging louder and hanging around when there's no answer, grabbing candy without even a muttered thank you...

[smiles33]

Yeah, I just went to get our bowl and someone STOLE it. DH should have listened to me and just turned off the porch light when we went to put the girls to bed. The kids out after 8 pm in our neighborhood are all older kids without parents tagging along. Then again, I guess I should have listened to DH and just used a crappy cardboard box to put the candy in but I thought that looked tacky. Sigh.

[lizzywednesday]

I know. Isn't this universal?!? What is confusing about it?

...

I don't get it; I nearly killed a kid 2 years ago because DD was sleeping.

This year, TOT has been postponed due to the storm. (Which actually gives me time to get treats ...)

[twowhat?]

I know. Isn't this universal?!? What is confusing about it?

Catherine

Actually I have a funny, because it is apparently confusing to DH. We had an argument over the porch light thing while ToTing - he wanted the girls to go ahead and knock on the doors of houses that had halloween decorations lit up or lights on from interior rooms (but no porch lights on). He said "why would you put up halloween decorations if you're not going to participate in ToT?" I was like uhhh...you can celebrate halloween but not be home that night, or be out with your own kids, etc. Then we argued over a house that had interior lights on, but the porch lights were clearly off. LOL. So I guess it CAN be confusing?

Aren't the porch lights supposed to be the determining factor?

[infomama]

And then there's a pounding on the door. Not a kid knock, but a hard pounding on the door. Seriously, like 8 seconds of "boom! boom! boom! boom! boom! boom!" on the door. And then, after about 15 seconds, I hear a man's voice say, "They're taking too long!" and off they went to pound on my neighbor's door, with the same results.

Is be standing in the other side of the door racking a shotgun.

[mm123]

After we put DDs to bed, we left the porch light on, but I hung up a large "SORRY- NO MORE CANDY" sign on the front door. Worked like a charm!

[KrisM]

I wish there was something more clear than lights on. It's not dark here until ToT is well underway and kids just don't think to look for lights. And some people forget to turn them on because it's not dark. It makes it confusing.

But, in the dark, it's easy. Skip the houses without a porch light on.

[fivi2]

Yeah, the porch light was a bit tricky when we started as it was still light out. And then apparently a lot of people have lights on timers or motion lights, so the light was on, but no one home. Or the people with strings of lights lit (like Christmas lights, but in Halloween colors) but not a porch light...that was confusing. ..

But sorry people kept knocking when the light was out! When our dog was alive, she'd bark whenever people came up to get candy from the bowl, even if they didn't knock.

[randomkid]

After we put DDs to bed, we left the porch light on, but I hung up a large "SORRY- NO MORE CANDY" sign on the front door. Worked like a charm!

This is what we do every year and it always works. DH writes a really nice sign that says "Sorry, out of candy. Come back next year." This year, DSD1 was here and wrote the sign in English and Spanish since we have a lot of Spanish speaking people in our area. Not one knock or doorbell after that. We can hear them out there, but they just leave when they see the sign.