On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 14:19:58 EDT, "beeswing" wrote:

She wants to design costumes in conjunction with a friend of hers. The
friend is 13...maybe 14. Plus she thinks it's fun. She doesn't have any
secret evil plans, at least as far as I can sense.

One of the young teenagers who came to our house last year was dressed
as a cat, and was also carrying a well-behaved real cat in a basket. I
was impressed with the cat, and also with the costume that was chosen
for impressiveness rather than cargo-carrying ability.

Perhaps you could offer to host the group of friends after the
trick-or-treating and drive them home or have them sleep over, so they
could socialize, eat candy together, enjoy each other's costumes,
watch scary movies ... which are all pastimes that could become part
of their tradition in later years as the trick-or-treating becomes
less central.

Louise