October 29, 2021 — “Wishing you pleasures great and small,” is how the inside of this card reads, before closing with Happy Birthday. Being a relatively small company, Cardthartic leaves Halloween cards to the big guys but, because this would have made such a fun one, we’re using it to wish you a good one!
I’ve shared this story before, how my mother loved sending cards for all occasions and celebrating Everything … except Halloween. Consequently, she never let her kids go trick-or-treating. Nope, not once was I allowed to don a costume and hit the streets. Year after year I tried cajoling, pleading, whining … all to no avail. “If you want candy, we’ll buy candy,” she’d say, “but no child of mine is going door-to-door saying, ‘Gimme!’”
Ay yi yi. Always the same infuriating, thoroughly un-American answer, even when I tried, “What if I just dress up, refuse all candy, and accept only money for UNICEF?” One raised eyebrow said it all. “What if we stay in and read instead,” was always Mom’s Halloween Plan for me.
It was in my 20s that I spotted The Perfect Card with my mom written all over it. :) On the cover it read, “For your front door this Halloween.” Inside was a die-cut, ready-to-hang sign that said, “Welcome, Children. The Next History of Halloween Lecture Begins in Approximately 15 Minutes. Please Sit and Wait Quietly.” Hahahahaha. I had one of those moments that all true cardies know well — when a card expresses your sentiments so exactly that your irrepressible laughter rings out from the card aisle, making everyone else in the store crack a knowing smile.
I sent that card to my mother every other year for the next 20, and Mom sent it back every other year to me. It was The Cardthartic Experience through-and-through as it conveyed, “I see you, I get you, I forgive you, I love you,” all in its clever card way.
Gone 16 years now, Mom’s stance on trick-or-treating still makes no sense to me, but she did redeem herself in my eyes by going on to become Cardthartic’s original Fairy Cardmother (another story for another day). ❤️ Little did we know that our shared love of cards would lead to the wonderful, active Cardie Community of today. But I know she would be so proud of us all making the world a better place … one card at a time.
Always big on humor, Mom would say, “Gotta keep laughing, Jo!” and lobby for adding more light-hearted cards to our lines. So, in her honor and that of the candy-beggars who would surely not stay for her lecture, below you’ll see some of our more popular “funny cards” for you today. Do have a safe and happy Halloween!
Jodee Stevens
Founder & Chief Creative
I will think of your wonderful Mom when I don my dog mask to answer the door on Halloween with scary music playing in the background.
UNICEF donations! Jodee, you have always been so clever. Love you.
With a nickname of Candy needless to say Halloween is my favorite holiday :)
A friend sent me a card years ago that had a message to cut out that I put on our sidelight every year. “Welcome Kiddies! Leave all your goodies in the box below, go quietly and no one will get hurt.” It is my favorite part of my Halloween season.
As a child, I too couldn’t go trick or treating for candy but could dress up and go for UNICEF and then we had a party at a rural school. I always wanted a store bought costume but alas I was always a ghost with an old sheet thrown over my head with two holes cut out for the eyes. I could never get the sheet arranged quite right so I could see very well. One Halloween, I stepped onto someone’s porch and right into a shallow bucket of eggs, they had gathered that day. The next year my mom bought me my one and only store bought costume.