Everyone has friends who obsess over Halloween, seemingly all year round. They like scary objects, keep skull erasers in their work desk, watch horror movies every weekend, and can be counted on to know where all the haunted scream parks are within an hour’s drive from your hometown.

Or maybe that friend is you.

No judgement here, you’re our kind of person.

You’ve been thinking about how to keep it Halloween all year round. And  you’re already off to a great start.

We feel kind of ripped off that you’re only really allowed to do it a couple of weeks every year around Halloween. Let’s think about what we love about Halloween, and how to keep it coming!

We love feeling afraid

Some people call us adrenaline junkies or fear addicts, but we don’t mind the labels.

There is some truth to it. We enjoy getting scared. We enjoy heart pounding in our ears, jumping out of our seat scares when we watch a movie.

So let’s schedule a couple nights a month to get together with friends and really scare ourselves. Research some of the scariest movies, a mix of ones you have seen and haven’t seen, and cue them up.

In between, take a break from horror films so the thrill feels new again.

We love gothic items

There is something evocative and alluring about the castles, the ghouls, the bats, and the whole Halloween wardrobe. You really can’t blame us. Vampires are the real royalty of the mythology world, what with their immortality and sparkly skin.

So how can we decorate our work space and our home space so it says “welcome” while also saying “goth?”

It doesn’t take a lot. Instead of a styrofoam gravestone in the middle of your front yard, why not have a stone peeking out from behind your bushes? And when friends ask, you can answer, “That was here when we moved in. We were warned not to move it, so I‘ve learned to like it there.”

Allow one or two “halloween” items to creep into your decor in every room. You can plead laziness when Mom stops by, but you know the real reason.

Send Halloween gifts

One local woman, a big fan of fright, regularly sends her daughter doll heads. Sometimes she has bloodied them up a little, sometimes they are horrific just as she finds them.

Perhaps you have a couple friends who would get a fright out of a well-timed “gift?”

Hopefully you can find a way to keep Halloween all year round!