KEY POINTS:
Burnley Tce was the place to be for trick-or-treating in Auckland last night.
The Mt Eden street was speckled with Halloween decorations - jack-o'-lanterns, pictures of ghosts and fake cobwebs. Ghouls, witches, wizards, zombies, pirates, fairies - even Snow Whites - were out to play.
At one house halfway down the street, Alison Laurent could almost pass for a real witch. The grey-haired woman served lollies from a cauldron with her 16-year-old daughter Kassie. At their house, three cats run about and an old clock chimes in the background.
"I've heard a few comments that this is the house to go to on Halloween," Ms Laurent said.
It's 6.30pm and the mother-and-daughter pair have already gone through 12 bags of lollies.
The US tradition of Halloween seems to be getting more popular, Ms Laurent said.
"I think it's all the American stuff that kids are being exposed to on TV."
Julia McAuley took her 2-year-old son Jude - a self-proclaimed ghost, complete with a sheet wrapped around him and white face paint - to Ms Laurent's house to stock up on sugar. "He doesn't really know what Halloween is but he has a Thomas the Tank Engine book where a train turns into a ghost so that's why he wanted to be one," Mrs McAuley said.
"He will usually eat one or two lollies, get bored, and I'll eat the rest when he goes to bed. He forgets about them."
Mrs McAuley and a group of about five friends take their children trick-or-treating in one of their neighbourhoods each year.
At a nearby house, Nicola Burton answered her door dressed as an "old child-eating hag", wearing a mask scary enough to make an adult cry, and pink dishwashing gloves smeared in what appears to be blood. Sceptics would say it is tomato sauce, she said.
"Some little ones get quite a fright when they see me. I think they're a bit shell-shocked."
Max Dunshea, 5, gets quite a fright when the door opens.
"Show me a trick," Mrs Burton demands before he can have his sweet gift.
Max looks at her, bewildered.
Mrs Burton later explained the method to her madness.
"Kids these days are only worried about filling their bags with sweets. They should have a trick up their sleeve.
"I'm disappointed hardly any have tonight. As a Pom I found it weird getting into Halloween but since I've had children I'm in the spirit."
Max got his lollies and explained what he will do with them.
"I'm just going to stuff them into my mouth," he jokes.
"Nah, I will have one each day."
