Halloween or hurricane? Nocturnal treats — or nor'easter?

Given the weather events of the last two years, it's hard for New Jerseyans not to wonder whether Halloween will happen at all.

Hurricane Sandy, which made landfall last Oct. 29, was scary enough. Then, Gov. Chris Christie announced the holiday would be postponed. ("My children want to know if I don't like Halloween," Christie said at a press conference Tuesday. "I'm fine with Halloween.")

On Oct. 29, 2011, a nor'easter dumped heavy, wet snow onto still-leafy trees. "Snowtober" downed thousands of trees, caused massive power outages and a treacherous Halloween for the few who were able to venture out. Many towns canceled trick-or-treating altogether.

This year, parents and children throughout New Jersey are hoping for a return to normal.

In Belleville, a rubber man gyrated in a faux electric chair outside State Fair, a Halloween costume and decor store. Hanging on her family's shopping cart, 9-year-old Kiara Arebalo scowled. But she reserved her disgust for another ghoulish character.

"Sandy was horrible because Halloween wasn't here, Kiara said.

Assuming conditions prove fairer this time around, the young Elizabeth resident said she'd be wearing the guise of a cat. "Maybe."

Brian Toal and his daughter Brieaghan, 5, of Harrison, shop for Halloween at the State Fair store in Belleville.

Last October, Jennifer Callie of Little Falls was over the moon about her son, Anikan, getting to wear his first-ever Halloween outfit.

When the storm hit, she still dressed the then 6-month-old up — as a pumpkin — and posed him next to real pumpkins for pictures. Yet Sandy made sure Callie wouldn't be taking her little pumpkin outside.

"This year I am like, 'We are going no matter what,'" she said. In 2012, the governor signed an executive order "moving" Halloween to the following Monday.

But "if it's not on Halloween it doesn't really count," said Callie. "We'll go out in the hurricane. Forget it, we're just going."

As a line for hayrides formed at Hillsdale's Demarest Farms on an October weekend this year, Maria Cox surveyed a patch of mums. Inside a farm store, fall revelers waited for doughnuts while a furry, automated spider with glowing red eyes bobbed over candy corn and caramel apples.

"It's not hard to get into the festivities when it's 80 degrees out," said Cox. Last October, when the weather wasn't as kind, "somebody got a little upset," she said, referring to her 9-year-old daughter, Katelyn. "Paramus actually scheduled for a few days later," she said. "But nobody in Paramus knew about it." It was hardly the first order of business when a blackout ensured the drone of generators sounded like a phalanx of lawnmowers. (On Oct. 7, a small tornado hit the borough, prying trees from lawns, winds gusting to 100 mph.)

Mary Mankowich, 11, of Nutley, searches for a costume at State Fair.

On a quieter day in Basking Ridge, Mina Yanuz picked apples at Ripple Hill Farm with her daughter Myra, 11.

"I think this year is gonna be OK," she said, recalling her horror story of October 2012: A total of 10 days without electricity, spending three of them with two other families in another that had a generator.

But Halloween?

"It never happened," she said. At least not for Basking Ridge. She brought her children to Pompton Lakes, where a celebration was held to salvage the day. However, sitting inside playing board games — whether during 2011's snow or Hurricane Sandy — had its merits, said Myra. No phones, no TV, no distractions. And now, they own a generator. Plus there is, said Yanuz, at least one cost-cutting benefit of the storm — no new costumes.

"They're going to wear the same clothing," she said. "So I save."

A defiant message to Sandy is imprinted on an 8-acre corn maze at Ort Farms in Long Valley, Morris County: "Stronger than the Storm," with "NJ" etched in the state's outline. After Hurricane Sandy, the area was without power for two weeks, said Nicole Ort, 24, a fifth-generation farm manager.

"The whole morale of the town and business obviously dropped," she said.

The corn maze at Long Valley's Ort Farms this year acknowledges Hurricane Sandy's impact on the fall and Halloween season.

One Halloween tradition last year proved that it was, indeed, stronger than the storm. Hurricane Sandy left the Hoboken PATH flooded and cars submerged — but the city's Ragamuffin Parade, an annual procession of costumed children held on Halloween, didn't skip a year.

Instead, it floated to Nov. 12, its presence a sign of routine carrying on down Washington Street.

"The city wanted to show that things were getting back to normal," said Geri Fallo, director of Hoboken's division of cultural affairs. "Everybody had been through such an ordeal." That parade should march on as normal this Oct. 31.

Across the Hudson River, the fate of the NYC Village Halloween Parade was less certain. Due to losses from Sandy — the event was canceled last year, resulting in lost revenue — organizers launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds. In 2011, the October snowstorm had also presented a fair challenge.

"We lost electricity and I ran the whole entire parade off my cell phone," said Jeanne Fleming, artistic and producing director of the parade for 33 years. The parade met its $50,000 Kickstarter goal ahead of schedule, but if it hadn't, the event's 40th anniversary would not have occurred, said Fleming. "It's scary, isn't it?"

A scene from New York's Village Halloween Parade in 2011. The annual event sustained losses due to its cancellation last year, and was just revived by a Kickstarter campaign.

Meanwhile UNICEF, the organization that depends on elementary school students for fundraising on Halloween, sustained a dropoff last year. "We were dramatically impacted" said Caryl Stern, president and CEO. "Trick or treat was not top-of-mind for anyone."

Another ritual evaded Sandy completely. The Last Fling Pumpkin & Football Sling, a rally of pumpkin-chucking trebuchets and catapults in Warren County, proceeded as planned Oct. 19 and 20 of this year, too. "As long as it's safe for the kids to shoot their machines, we'll be on," said organizer Giulia Iannitelli, ahead of the sling.

But at Chester's Alstede Farms, as children scaled a pyramid of hay bales, Donna Muccione cringed thinking of last Halloween. "It was such a weird time," she said, helping her 2-year-old grandson shake hands with an inflatable pumpkin. "It just wasn't the same."

The Mazza family visited the farm from Ocean County. Last October, their Bayville neighborhood was no place to let their son Levi, 6, and daughter Eliana, 5, go door to door for candy.

"All the streets were dark," said Matt Mazza, and floodwater ran high.

"There was nothing we could do," said his wife, Mollie, who was then very pregnant with their youngest daughter Violet, born Nov. 17.

Now, they have a tiny mermaid costume ready for something they hope she'll get to see — her first Halloween.

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