A Halloween Tradition

by Kim Van Sickler

The Haunted Hayride at Lake Farmpark in Kirtland, Ohio.  To the girls in Troop 71009, it wouldn't be Halloween without it.

For our very first year, we had my (very tall) husband dressed in a wild wig (= very scary), and every time a wagon came around he'd pick up the pumpkin (Brooke) and run with her to this makeshift outhouse where she'd thrash around as if she was trying to escape.

The year we were assigned to the Addams Family site, every time a wagon drove by we'd blare a snippet from MC Hammer's Addams Family movie song and perform a 20-second dance.

The following year we got a tent. After the wagon rides, people stopped by to watch our dancing skeleton show. (We extinguished the lights and the costumes glowed in the dark.) The routine consisted of a bunch of song snippets weaved together, and we learned the simple choreography an hour before the hayrides began. 

We spoofed America's Next Top Model next. Every time one of the wagons passed our station, we played the theme song for America's Next Top Model, and the girls vogued down a catwalk in their "designer" duds.



Our big year!!! 2011. We paired up with some guy friends to choreograph, design our set, create our costumes, and do our make-up for Timewarp 2.0, a nod to the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Another tent production. This one was ten minutes long. Unlike other Haunted Hayride years, this station was ours and only ours. We performed our routine every night of the event, about 90 times total, and our girls used all this work to earn their Silver Award, the highest honor a Cadette Girl Scout can earn.

Now we're Senior Girl Scouts (9th grade). This year we showed up one weekend before Hayrides began to, among other things, cut down corn stalks and fashion them into decorations.

At a fundraising event to raise money for the Haunted Hayride, we served refreshments and ran a craft.

Then for our big night on October 27th, the girls staffed a haunted tent that lured in all of the brave souls and actually sent some not-so-brave ones skedaddling. We did our best to startle, frighten, and entertain.

What are some of your favorite Halloween traditions?