The Spookiest (and Funnest) Time of the Year

I’ll admit it – I love Halloween season. When the kids were younger, we would elaborately decorate our house with everything from tombstones to gremlins. One year we borrowed from the haunted jail on Briggs a smoke-breathing dragon. We mounted it on the window of our upper floor that looks down on the entrance to the house and, when unsuspecting trick-or-treaters came calling, it would light up and billow smoke from its snout.

For me, this love for the spooky originated when I was a kid living on Rincon Avenue in Sun Valley. We had a typical single-story ranch-style house. On the porch, across from the window air conditioner, was a framework of nine squares. In each I would put a pumpkin, spider or some other creepy thing, then stretch cheesecloth across to make a sort of spider web. One year I had friends lie on the lawn and, after trick-or-treaters got their booty and made their way across our lawn, my friends would rise, as if from the dead, and scare the business out of them. Another year a boyfriend of mine, wearing a creepy mask and overalls, sat still as a stone in a rocking chair on the front porch. Every now and then he would jump at a trick-or-treater, once again scaring them to bits. Ah, what fun.

When we moved up here, our first house was a back house and we got few trick-or-treaters, much to my sorrow. But when we moved up the road to a prominent house on a kid-centric street, we could indulge our Halloween fantasies and know they would be seen … and appreciated. Thankfully, the boys were as eager as I to decorate the house and we had all kinds of scenarios that we played out.

But now there are no longer boys living at home and, aside from a pumpkin on the front porch, there is little decoration. It’s tough to get to the props and the thought of having to set up everything and tear it down is just too much for me.

However, I still love Halloween … and I’m not alone. Throughout the Crescenta Valley, stretching from Sunland to La Cañada, are fellow Halloween enthusiasts. Bless them – they have the time and/or energy to indulge in decorating their property, ensuring a good scare for their friends and neighbors.

CV Weekly celebrates their efforts and, for the second year, with the Glendale Area Schools Credit Union, is hosting Fun and Frights in the Foothills. We launched this drive-by/walking tour last year when the pandemic was at its height. We wanted to showcase those places that folks decorated for Halloween, providing a safe way to enjoy their work by creating a list of addresses that were ready with a quick scare. We decided to do it again and, with the support of the credit union, Property Masters Realty, CVWD and C&M Printing, are putting together a list of places you won’t want to miss this Halloween.

Do you want your house on the list? Then send us your address at HollyWeen@cvweekly.com and we will tell people to make sure and stop by.

The list will be printed in the Oct. 28 issue of the CV Weekly.