Raise your hand if you remember wearing a Halloween costume complete with a flimsy plastic mask held on by an impossibly thin elastic band! Most of us here at BabyQuip were raised wearing these types of costumes (or other DIY gems) and enjoyed simple tricks and treats. It was a time when the only treat bucket option was an orange plastic jack-o-lantern. Do they still make those things?
Halloween grows each year with people spending more and more money on costumes, decorations, candy, and haunted goods. Retailers have stepped up their game with creative offerings which have made Halloween the highest-grossing holiday second only to Christmas. A far witch’s cry from the uncomplicated spooky adventures of years past.
We asked BabyQuip employees about their Halloween memories and favorites that you’ll surely relate to! Turns out we are mostly a bunch of chocolate-munching, scaredy-cats who prefer to watch It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown during the Halloween season! Read on to find out more about our quirky Halloween likes and dislikes and to see our priceless Halloween pics and memories!
Fran Maier – BabyQuip CEO & Founder
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? I liked being a gypsy, still do!
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Spiders!
Best Halloween memories? I remember trick or treating in the snow in Santa Fe!
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? Young Frankenstein
Candy Corn or Twix? Chocolate
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? NO!
Nicole Kitzman – Director of Recruiting & Community
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? I dressed up like Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction. It was spot on! That’s about as creative as I’ve gotten with Halloween. Not very kid appropriate but the moms and dads will know who that is.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Snakes! I don’t want to run into them anywhere, actually.
Best Halloween memory and why? My Nana would dress up as a witch and give out candy on her porch. She had a cauldron and spoke and laughed in a witchy voice. Her house was the favorite in the the neighborhood. As a young child, it was so hard for me to believe it was my Nana in that witch costume and with that amazing witch voice. As we got older, we loved peeking through the window and seeing her scare the older children.
Favorite monster or villain? None – I like the good guys :-)
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? Hotel Transylvania
Candy Corn or Twix? Chocolate. Always chocolate
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? No and I don’t want to know what it is. I am a scaredy cat
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? I am going as ….Me. So Lame, I know.
Jen Wold – Sr. Marketing Manager
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? Casper the Friendly Ghost! I was four years old and it was my very first store-bought costume. Don’t ask me why I picked it because I was scared to death of Casper. I literally cried when I saw myself in the mirror but looking back it was my only traditional Halloween themed costume. Those are my fav!
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Javalina! those things seriously creep me out!
Best Halloween memory and why? Where I grew up, trick-or-treating consisted of dressing up in your best costume and preparing your best joke. On Beggars Night we had to tell jokes in order to get candy at each house. If the person giving out the candy gave the correct answer to the joke they got to steal a piece of your candy. As an adult handing out candy, I have to say there is nothing more adorable than listening to a 2 or 3 year old, dressed up cute as can be, trying to tell their joke!
Favorite monster or villain? Were Rabbit from Curse of the Were-Rabbit
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? The Corpse Bride (can you see I have a thing for stop-motion animations?!)
Candy Corn or Twix? Most definitely Candy Corn
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? NO!
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? Every year I spend so much time helping my kids with their costumes I don’t dress up. Boring, I know.
Joe Maier – Director of Technology
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? Amazon Prime. Used a bunch of Amazon boxes to make a robot/transformer costume.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Werewolf
Best Halloween memory and why? Trick-or-treating at the foreing embassies in Washington DC. Funny because some of them like the Japanese went all out and had whole rooms devoted for the trick or treaters. Others clearly had no idea this was a thing and were really confused why a bunch of American kids were knocking on their doors.
Favorite monster or villain? Norman Bates
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? Beetlejuice
Candy Corn or Twix? Candy Corn
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? No
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? Maverick from Top Gun
Related articles:
- The Spooky History of Halloween
- 8 Trick-or-Treating Alternatives for Halloween
- BabyQuip Baby Gear Rentals: How to Get Started
Andreas Stenzel – Co-Founder & VP of Demand Generation and Business Development
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? Star wars anything, hands down. Stormtrooper , Han solo, anything, whether homemade or store bought.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. The automated red-eyed barking dog that jumps at you.
Halloween memory and why? As a kid, it was pouring out, huge bags of candy on the table and feasting til we were completely sick. Nowadays it was with my kids when they were 2 or 3 or so and it was all new to them. Cute, fun, and memorable.
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
Candy Corn or Twix? Twix
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? No
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? Frankenstein
Tania Griffith – Front End Developer
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? One year I dressed up like a “Hippy”, but I clearly had no idea what that meant. I put finger paint all through my hair. The paint dried and my hair was mutli-color and very cruchy. I wore blue John Lennon glasses, a baja jacket and some bell bottoms I found in my mom’s closet.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Spiders. The bigger and hairier the spider, the more disturbing it is.
Best Halloween memory and why? Two years ago, when I was pregnant with my first daughter, my husband and I went to a Halloween party. We were wearing matching costumes that everyone kept commenting on. I was the only sober person there, so all of our drunk friends kept going out of their way to make sure I was having a good time. I laughed pretty much non-stop all night long. Then, at the end of the night, my husband and I won “Best Costume.”
Favorite monster or villain? Jack Torrance
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? Beetlejuice
Candy Corn or Twix? Twix, no doubt
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? My cousins and I used to do this all the time. We’d stand in the dark bathroom chanting in the mirror and then be terrified for the rest of the day!
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? It’s going to be a last minute costume. We didn’t think we’d be doing anything, but plans changed! Now I just have to decide on something.
Ana Vela – Web Operations Developer
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? I loved being Minnie Mouse one year.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Zombies
Best Halloween memory and why? I remember how my mom would make most of my Halloween costumes from scratch when I was growing up. We would go to our local fabric shop to pick out a pattern and buy all the necessary materials. She’d sew while my brother and I were at school, so we didn’t see all the work that went into this. I made an Obi-Wan Kenobi costume for my son when he was in Kindergarten, and I’d also work on his costume while he was in school. It was quite a learning process and took me about a month since I had limited time to work on it. I enjoyed every moment of that project, and I also appreciated my mom so much more.
Favorite monster or villain? Darth Vader
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
Candy Corn or Twix? Twix
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? No
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? I don’t dress up anymore. It’s all about the kids now!
Trish McDermott – Co-Founder & VP of Communications
What was your all-time favorite Halloween costume? We made our own costumes with whatever we could find around the house. That often meant we were ghosts, what we called “hobos” in those days, devils or athletes–the sport based on whatever we had around at the time. One year I went as a hippy, as it was the early 70s and we all sort of dressed that way anyway.
Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or abandoned building. Vampires! I know they’re not real, but still…
Best Halloween memory and why? In New Jersey we had something called “Mischief Night” which was on the night before Halloween. This was the one night a year when you were actually allowed–sort of encouraged–to go out and make a little trouble in the neighborhood. We would plan for days in advance, sometimes electing to stay home and defend our house, usually with a pile of water balloons, other times plotting minor acts of mischief (wrapping a tree in toilet paper, upturning all the lawn furniture) we would deliver to a good friend’s house. It’s hard to imagine this happening today, but back then it was done in good fun–and we loved it! Since there were eight kids in my family, I have fond memories of our little army defending our home on the eve of Halloween!
Favorite monster or villain? The Grinch
What’s your favorite Halloween themed movie? It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
Candy Corn or Twix? We wait all year for candy corn!
Have you ever played Bloody Mary? This was a thing at my kids’ school. You had to chant “Bloody Mary” in the restroom mirror and then a spirit appeared. They all have come home with Bloody Mary stories!
What are you going to be for Halloween this year? Halloween is a big social event for the entire family in my town and it all happens in one neighborhood. Parents go over-the-top in decorating their homes and then Halloween night is one giant open-house party. Food and drinks (and wine) are served in many homes. Since there are no sidewalks, and the traffic gets a little crazy, parents rarely wear masks or dress up at all, except for the parents doing performance art on their front lawn, or running a haunted house. We are mostly focused on keeping track of our kids in the mayhem!
Jennifer leads the marketing efforts at BabyQuip and is constantly trying to reinvent awesomeness through written copy, visual appeal, creative content & SEO. Jennifer is a mom of two boys and knows first hand the struggles of traveling with babies, toddlers and kids. When Jennifer’s head isn’t swimming with new marketing ideas you’ll find her tending to her backyard chickens and practicing meditation.
Hey, This article is really good.
This memories are great. I too had a flimsy plastic mask a couple years. Most likely miss Piggy and Minnie Mouse. I do recall being a “teacher” and it was just borrowed outfit from my moms coworkers daughter.