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It's not the spooky decorations in their yard or the creepy music that has carloads of children showing up to their Glen Ellyn home on Halloween.
Susan Woods and her husband, Tyler, give out candy, but that's not why the neighborhood kids line up on their front steps and down the street.
In their matching skeleton aprons, the husband-and-wife team cook and serve 350 hot dogs - all placed in buns and wrapped individually in foil - for trick-or-treaters.
"It's absolutely bonkers. Hundreds of people come," neighbor Tracy Mehr said.
The Woods family has been turning out Halloween hot dogs from their hillside Glen Ellyn home for the past 14 years. Around town, it's known as the "hot dog house." A separate condiment table is set up on the lawn so trick-or-treaters can help themselves to whatever toppings they want.
"It's just so darn fun that we just have to keep doing it," Susan Woods said. "It's worth it. And it's a fun memory for our family."
When unsuspecting visitors arrive - child-size witches and vampires thinking they were only having candy for dinner - they're in for a surprise.
The hot dog bundle slides down PVC pipes from the front porch and out a huge skeleton face, through the right eye socket. Candy flies out the left.
Never one to rest on her laurels, Woods invented the hot dog delivery system - the 15-foot-long "Halloween hot dog slide" - in a time of social distancing.
"She's just joyful, generous, fun and funny, and committed to the community and just has been an absolute stellar friend to us and an amazing neighbor," Mehr said.
The hot dogs - Woods buys in bulk - take over the fridge. All those frankfurters are cooked in big stock pots on the stove and kept warm in five roasters. While the parents work the kitchen, their kids - Nile, a sophomore at Glenbard West High School, and Sylvia, a fifth-grader - help send hot dogs down the slide before they go off on their Halloween haunts.
"It is a lot of work," Woods said. "Your kitchen kind of gets messy at the end of the night. It's kind of organized chaos."
She doesn't sweat the kitchen chaos. She relishes it. She's a nurse who used to work a night shift in the ER on Halloween and a proud do-it-yourselfer.
"We wanted to just keep it old-fashioned. We wanted to keep it simple," Woods said. "We didn't want it to be fancy pantsy. People over the years, our neighbors, would say why don't you hire someone or why don't you cater it? We don't want it to be something that it's not."
The idea seems simple: who doesn't want a warm hot dog, essential Chicago food, on a chilly fall evening? For Woods, Halloween hot dogs are a taste of her childhood in Iowa.
'A fun memory'
Back in grade school, she and her friends would map out their trick-or-treating route weeks in advance. If their timing was right, they would get homemade popcorn balls from one house and grilled hot dogs from another.
"You knew the dentist who gave out toothbrushes. And there was one house at the very end of a long street, and they gave out full-size candy bars," Woods recalled. "We kind of just planned our route according to that. But there was always something special about the house that had hot dogs."
Woods grew up in Council Bluffs, a city in southwest Iowa. This was the '80s. Trick-or-treating didn't start until it was dark outside. Her mom made her Halloween costumes. She still remembers the brick house where she could have a hot dog dinner.
"It's just a fun memory that I had as a kid," Woods said, "and I just wanted to pass it on to my neighborhood and a new generation of kids."
As newlyweds, Woods and her husband got out the grill and rekindled those memories. They started passing out Halloween candy and hot dogs from their home in Des Moines. The hot dog tradition continued when they moved to Wisconsin and then to Glen Ellyn in 2009. They had about 70 trick-or-treaters that year.
"I was really surprised, and I thought, 'OK, that's kind of weird or different,'" Mehr said. "And then I saw people are maniacs for it."
Woods and her husband ditched the grill and beefed up production to keep up with crowds. As for condiments, they have relish, mustard and - this might sound scary to Chicago-style purists - extra ketchup. "In fact, I put out two ketchup bottles," Woods said.
'A labor of love'
As word-of-mouth spread, the hot dog line kept getting longer and longer. The house became the stuff of Halloween legend.
"We could be outside in the middle of summer, mowing the grass or planting flowers or whatever, and kids will ride their bikes by ... and then they'll be someone who says, 'Are you the hot dog house?'" Woods said.
She and her husband can prepare, at most, 350 franks. They don't keep track of the cost. It's a "labor of love," Tyler Woods said.
"All the neighborhood kids enjoy it," he said. "Our kids' friends come over now, and they're hanging out in the yard if it's nice enough. The yard's full of kids."
When their kids were little, they took turns trick-or-treating with them and staying home to distribute hot dogs. Last October, Susan Woods was on crutches after she broke her ankle. She usually goes to her daughter's elementary school Halloween parade, jogs home and starts getting the hot dogs ready.
"We made it work. You can't be the hot dog house and not have hot dogs," she said.
The family encourages parents to take a dog, too. They tend to run out by 5:30 p.m.
"It is just a gas," Mehr said. "It really creates such wonderful energy in the neighborhood."
The neighbors roast each other. She's a "great foil," and she gives as good as she gets, Mehr said. Hot dog puns aside, they're a creative, thoughtful and generous couple, he said.
"They love joy and love to be busy and love projects," Mehr said.
Some kids show up toting a Halloween candy haul, Susan Woods said, but it's the hot dog that they remember most.
"Hopefully, they can pass it forward as well," she said, "and there could be more hot dog houses later on down the road."
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