Booing your neighbors this Halloween is easy with this You’ve Been Booed Kit and free printable. It’s a fun anonymous neighborhood tradition.
For more ways to make this the best holiday, check out all of our Halloween posts.
Have you been booed? It’s the cutest “chain letter” ever. If you ask me, it’s a lot better than that Amish friendship bread that went around when I was a kid. For the last few years, I’ve gifted this You’ve Been Booed kit to our neighbors.
(But don’t tell them. They still don’t know it’s me!)
Booing your neighbors is basically reverse trick-or-treating. You put together a You’ve Been Booed Kit, then sneak around at night, and leave it on your neighbors’ doorsteps.
It’s a great way to surprise your neighbors without them feeling that they have to pay you back.
Because they have to pay it forward.
If it’s hot where you are, you have to make a couple concessions with your boo kits, like, not putting any chocolate in them.
For more help if you do live somewhere that’s summer all the time, our How To Boo Your Neighbors When It’s Hot Out is for you.
You’ve Been Booed Kit: Frequently Asked Questions
Before we get to the assembly of the kits, let’s talk a little bit about what booing your neighbors means.
To boo your neighbor, or booing your neighbor, means putting together a little treat, then anonymously leaving it on your neighbor’s doorstep.
It’s basically reverse trick-or-treating.
The kit comes with a note that explains that the recipient has been boo’d and asks them to boo other neighbors who haven’t been booed yet.
The earlier you can boo your neighbors, the better. That gives them enough time to put together gifts for other neighbors and for the chain to carry itself throughout the neighborhood.
Personally, I wait until the first full week of October to boo our neighbors. Anything earlier than that feels too early.
Also, the “We’ve Been Boo’d” sign is meant to hang on a neighbors door after they’ve been booed and until Halloween, so no one really wants that on their door for a full month.
Halloween treats, cookies, or novelties are perfect in a boo basket. You’ll also want to add the printable below.
You’ve Been Booed Kit And Free Printable
Affiliate links are included in this sponsored post and Drugstore Divas may make a small commission if you use them.
What’s really fun about this You’ve Been Boo’d Kit is you can fill it with anything you want. If you know your neighbors can’t have gluten, skip baked goods and go with pretzels or candy. If you know your neighbors are vegan, skip sour cream potato chips and just use regular chips.
I always make mine all the same because I make a dozen a year. That’s the problem with being social.
So, in order to make these in bulk, I have to skip the little touches like making homemade gift bags. But if you have a few less to make, you can personalize them more than I do.
You’ve Been Booed Kit Supplies:
- Gift bags
- Halloween candy
- Halloween cookies
- Any other fun items you want
- You’ve Been Booed free printable (see the end of the post for that)
How To Make A You’ve Been Booed Kit:
Start with a fun bag.
Now, usually, I cheat a little bit with this.
I used a pre-made ghost for these You’ve Been Boo’d bags. It’s actually a ghost-shaped candy bar wrapper affixed to a gift bag.
Once you have the bags, fill them with candy, treats, cookies, or whatever you think your neighbors will like.
Vary the candy that you use. Add some chocolate, some lollipops, some marshmallows, and even go with some non-candy items.
Every year, I stick Halloween notebooks and pencils in the bags too because there are diabetics on our block and I don’t want them to feel left out. I’ve also put plastic Halloween cups inside as well.
Print one free printable (at the bottom of the post) per You’ve Been Boo’d Kit.
The free You’ve Been Booed printable gives instructions on how to boo your other neighbors.
You are, for lack of a better word, Patient Zero because you’re starting the chain.
So you print out the You’ve Been Booed printable (which also comes with the We’ve Been Booed printable on the other side), and then stick one in each Boo Bag.
The printable asks your neighbors to boo two other friends or neighbors — and stick the free printable inside, continuing the chain.
Homemade Halloween Treats To Add To Boo Bags:
If you’re sure your neighbors will eat homemade treats, you can make some homemade Halloween treats for your Boo Bags.
Our favorites for chocolate lovers are Halloween Chocolate Bark and Halloween Fudge. Kids will love our Halloween Chocolate Breakable Mummy.
And if you have some extra time, our Ghost Meringue Cookies and Halloween Pinwheel Cookies are adorable.
For more ideas, check out all of our Homemade Halloween Treats.
Booing Your Neighbors:
When you have the Boo Bags all ready, wait until nightfall. Then, when it’s dark and no one can see you (because part of the point of this is to be anonymous), leave the Boo Bag on each neighbor’s doorstep. There’s a good chance they’ll be sitting until morning, when your neighbors leave for work, so that’s why you don’t want to leave chocolate if you live somewhere that’s warm at night.
Now, I didn’t actually do it with the ones above, but you might want to get a ziptop plastic bag and put all the candy and any other edible items inside it. I always use all packaged food items, so I don’t have to worry about this. But, in case you’re putting in homemade items or repackaged items, definitely use a ziptop plastic bag. The absolute last thing you want is for animals or other critters to smell the food and eat it while the Boo Bag is outside. That would definitely be a trick, not a treat.
After a neighbor has been booed, they stick one half of the paper (the “We’ve Been Booed” half) on to their door. That way, people know to skip them and surprise someone else.
If everyone plays along, the entire neighborhood will be booed before Halloween.
So that’s why you want to boo your neighbors sooner rather than later. You can wait to boo your neighbors closer to Halloween, but that won’t really give them enough time to boo everyone else.
In that case, just be like me and boo the entire neighborhood at once. It’s easier that way.
If you do that, though, here’s a small tip. Put the “We’ve Been Boo’d” sign on your door as well. That way your neighbors think you’ve been booed by the same person who booed the rest of the neighborhood. If not, they’ll definitely realize it’s you doing the booing.
Now about that printable:
Free You’ve Been Booed/We’ve Been Booed Printable
You can make your own you’ve been booed/we’ve been booed printable if you want. But I also wanted to make life really easy for you, so above is the one that I use when I boo my neighbors.
I do cut out the www.drugstoredivas.net marking on it so no one knows it’s me (and actually, I did fool my entire neighborhood the first two years I did this, so that made me happy).
To save the printable, right click the image above and save it to your desktop. It’s formatted to fit an 8.5 x 11 inch piece of printer paper so you can easily print it at home.
When you’re ready, print it out for your Boo Bags. That’s it.
If you want more options, you can order You’ve Been Booed Printables online.
You’ve Been Boozed Gift:
If you know your neighbors really well, and they are over 21, you can change this to “You’ve Been Boozed” and leave a bottle of booze (wine, pumpkin beer, or liquor) on their doorstep instead.
You can pack your booze with these adorable You’ve Been Boozed Beer Bottle Label Stickers and Carrier.
Do you have any other you’ve been booed ideas? Be sure to leave those for us in the comments.