Despite the fact Halloween is not a nationally recognized holiday, La Salle students enthusiastically embrace their Halloween traditions in numerous ways, ranging from dressing up to carving pumpkins, as well as indulging in a number of other family festivities.
For many students, they love to spend their Halloween with their friends and family doing various activities, such as hosting scary movie sleepovers, attending haunted houses, and more. Junior Bella Cavalli said that her Halloween normally consists of partaking in common Halloween activities. “I spend Halloween at the pumpkin patch and then I go to a fall carnival with my friends,” she said.
Sophomore Gabrielle Jones has gone to the same haunted house for the last four years and invited some of her friends to join the tradition this year.
Senior Flora Peruzzo celebrates Halloween not only by dressing festively, but also doing festive activities with her family. “I like having fun earrings,” she said. She also enjoys hanging out with her family and listening to Halloween music. Some staple songs, Peruzzo says, are Monster Mash and Thriller.
Senior AJ Larson is able to tell when it’s the start of the Halloween season when he drives by a specific house in his neighborhood that is annually filled with decorations by Oct. 1 every year.
Freshman Jack London has a double celebration on Halloween, as Oct. 31 is also his mom’s birthday. In order to celebrate both events as a family, they all go to his cousin’s house where they go “trick-treating and just hang out,” he said.
As La Salle has a number of creative students, many tend to steer away from the traditional jack o ‘lantern faces and have more fun and intricate images for their pumpkin carving. To accomplish this, London’s family will find images online and print them out to trace.
The pumpkin patch serves as another staple traditional location around this time of year for many students. It gives students the ability to carve pumpkins but also to enjoy and create some delicious treats. Cavalli likes to make pumpkin pie and pumpkin soup with the pumpkins from the patch, while Jones likes to make apple strudel.
While at the pumpkin patch, Peruzzo and her family always get apple cider and pumpkin and apple flavored donuts to enjoy.
Also in the month of October, Cavalli and her siblings play pranks on each other. “It’s like a rivalry,” she said.
All of these students used to dress up and go trick or treating when they were younger, but some are unsure if these traditions will be continuing as they get older.
London’s favorite costume from when he was younger was Jack Skellington from “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and Larson was a SWAT agent with a walkie-talkie on his chest that his brother would use to talk to him while he was getting candy from houses.
Cavalli wore a glitter princess costume from kindergarten until she was in fourth grade, which she greatly adored. Jones had dressed up as a spider queen in third grade. For one year, Peruzzo was a unicorn.
Halloween is a holiday that can be enjoyed by all ages, as there are many different aspects that become more appealing with age, like handing out candy and going to haunted houses with friends. As students get older, new traditions will form and they will begin to celebrate the holiday in different ways.
