How do you “do” Halloween with all the treats and candy? This post will share with you my top tips as a mom and also a Dietitian for how to have a healthier halloween. 

Here’s the thing I want you to remember above all else. Halloween, it’s one night, maybe a few nights if you’re like us and you have a fall festival, or are doing other fall things this time of year.

Above all else, what is more important to me is what happens between the holidays on a daily basis, how you set boundaries around candy and treats…

Halloween is Halloween. For us, it means fall festivals, dressing up, being silly, and, trick or treating. How you talk to your kids about candy, treats, desserts the other 364 days a year, is what is more important than this one day a year.

A single night of eating too much candy won’t ruin their health (I mean it might make for some rough tantrums, rough next days and some diarrhea or constipation, depending on how sensitive your kid is to things like dyes, sugar, etc.) But, again, in the long run, I think it’s about the overall habits our kids have with food.

Here are some tips for a healthier halloween:

• You decide what is right for your family. I’ve seen some families do halloween differently.
• Families have other traditions around halloween night/trick or treating- i.e.. they go to a movie, they go to the pumpkin patch that night, etc. But some families I’ve seen avoid the night of trick or treating all together, but you can still dress up and have fun.
• Set expectations early. Talk to your kids before the event about how much they are going to have, what you are going to do with all the extra candy, what they are allowed to do to stay safe, etc. All of those expectations need to be had early on.
• The day after or that night have each child divide the candy into the ones he/she likes and the ones he/she doesn’t care about. Give or throw away the ones they don’t like.
• With the ones they do like, set boundaries about how much they can have each day, or how many pieces this week they can have. Maybe they can have 4 little pieces over the weekend, and you can choose when you want them, but you only get to have 4. If you eat them all on Friday, then no more over the weekend.
• The talk about not eating all your candy should be included in expectations about behavior, safety, etc. so not to make it a big “deal” about food and candy. It’s just part of what the family rules or boundaries are.
• Talking about candy doesn’t have to be all about the negative effects of sugar. We as adults know the list goes on and on… but with kids, it can be simple- too much candy makes it so we can’t run as fast, or we can’t grow as fast when we eat too much candy, so we need to slow down how much we are eating. Or, our dentist said our teeth could hurt if we eat too much.
• And you know what moms? Some kids need to learn by themselves that they are going to be in pain from eating too much. Some kids personalities just won’t work with trying to warn them. So, the next day after they ate too much and have a belly ache, diarrhea, or are really grouchy or mad, talk to them about that

“Hey bella, your tummy hurts and it doesn’t normally hurt this much, do you think it could have been from the extra candy?”

More options for a healthier Halloween:

• Try the switch witch. The switch witch, which I’d never heard of before this year, is you give your children the option to switch out their candy for toys,  if that’s in the cards for you. You can determine what is appropriate. Maybe it’s 5 pieces of candy = a new toy car, but 20 pieces = ___. Depending on their age you may have different switches.
• You could buy It back from them. Older children may like this concept, of being able to sell their candy back to their parents and be able to spend their money for whatever they want. Again, you determine what value is appropriate. We know that 2 pieces is worth like 50 cents, but maybe you again determine that 5 pieces is $3 and 20 pieces is $15.
• Many dentists and police departments will do trade ins. Your kids can donate their candy and in return get toys or whatever they are doing for their trade ins.
• As for what you’re passing out- pass out the mini versions, encourage proper portions. Buy treats with no articia Buy treats with no artificial colors/dyes, like YumEarth brand . Fruit snacks with no artificial colors/dyes, like the kind from Costco. Dark chocolate is going to be healthier than milk chocolate.
• If you have kids with allergies, know kids in your area who do, participating in the Teal Pumpkin Project is something that is really great- by putting a teal pumpkin outside it symbols to other kids and parents that you have allergy friendly options at your house.
• You could do non-food items such as:
  • Glow sticks, bracelets, or necklaces
  • Pencils, pens, crayons or markers
  • Bubbles
  • Halloween erasers or pencil toppers
  • Mini Slinkies
  • Whistles, kazoos, or noisemakers
  • Bouncy balls
  • Finger puppets or novelty toys
  • Coins
  • Spider rings
  • Vampire fangs
  • Mini notepads
  • Playing cards
  • Bookmarks
  • Stickers
  • Stencils

What will we do in our house?

Okay now let me share with you what I’ll be doing personally with my children and my family. Granted, my kids are two and four, so next year we may do things differently!. But here is our plan:

1. By the time halloween comes around, we will have been to 3 different fall/halloween/spooky events were candy and treats were a part of it. At each of those events, they chose their top 2 pieces of candy and ate them.
2. Throughout the week, there were no other special treats- ie. No doughnuts on Saturday morning, no random stops to get ice cream , etc.
3. We’ll eat a really healthy halloween dinner. Enjoy a few extra pieces the night of halloween.
4. We don’t have many kids in our neighborhood so we won’t be passing out candy. Actually, i’ve only passed out candy once in my adult/married life when we lived at Fort Benning, but other than that we were never somewhere to do it.
5. The next day I’ll offer up the switch witch idea, after the fact. She’s too into the event that night to talk about it, so I’ll talk about it after the fact.
6. Any candy that is still home, I’ll store some of their favorites for random treats. Maybe we’ll have it with dinner I’ll put in their lunch box one little piece over the next few days.
7. I’ll throw it all away before the next week begins. Halloween is on a Wednesday, so Sunday night, it’s all going away.

There are enough holidays and reasons to get other treats, and better quality treats, after Sunday night, so I don’t see any reason to keep the temptations around for them, or for myself.

How do you YOU handle halloween? Share  it below!