Halloween is so fun! A child’s dream: free candy at every door!
But then what? What do we do with All This Candy?
Ideas Families Have Tried:
1. Explain about Candy.
When Halloween approaches, Elizabeth takes the time to talk to her children about sugar.
Drawing from her biochemistry class, she diagrams a sugar molecule, which is a hexagon with
six tails. Elizabeth explains to her kids how each sugar molecule grabs six other molecules and
requires that many to digest itself. If you are not careful, she warns her kids, sugar will rob your
body of the good nutrients it needs. In effect, your body has to fight the sugar so it can’t fight
the sickness germs. (She also explains to them that sugar substitutes can cause cancer.)
So if you are smart, she tells her kids, you will eat only a little bit of candy after a good meal,
when there are plenty of good molecules to help your body digest it. With this said, Elizabeth’s
kids understand why she limits their candy. The message is “I love you, and I don’t want you to
get sick” rather than “I want to control your candy!”
2. Sort it.
In an effort to not eat too much candy, the Strong family fills up their Halloween evening. They
attend two get-togethers in the neighborhood and do just a small amount of trick-or-treating in
between the two. Then, they all get in the car to go to Grandmother’s house. There, after they
show Grandmother their costumes, they and dump out their candy for her to see and for
everyone to sort. “Look, I got four Starbursts!” “I’ll trade you for two suckers!” It’s everyone’s
favorite part of the evening, to spread it out and sort it. The ones who haven’t had enough, can
do a little more trick-or-treating in her immediate neighborhood, but by then, everyone is
usually ready to head for home. The bags of candy goes on top of the fridge and don’t come
down until after dinner each night, to sort some more!
Once the novelty has worn off, Susan gradually and carefully “files” the candy away in the “circular file.” (the garbage can)
3. Let them manage it wisely.
Pam tells her kids that they can keep and handle their own candy, IF they manage it well. But if
not, then she will manage it. She spells out what managing it well means: not getting into it
until after a good dinner! It’s a good exercise in self-control! Pam watches carefully and if she
sees wrappers or evidence of mismanagement, she takes over the candy, places it out of reach, and supervises it herself.
My Favorite Idea:
4. Save it!
We like to save our Halloween candy. The plan is to make Graham Cracker candy houses later
on, on New Year’s Eve to be exact (while we are waiting for midnight). The idea is that the more
candy you save, the more creative you can be when making your candy house.
Each piece of candy is examined to figure out what it can be on a candy house: Christmas lights,
windows, steps, or a plethora of creative things! “I can’t eat this,” they will say, “I’m saving it for
something special on my candy house.” And they don’t always plan houses! There is lots of
room for building creative structures—cars, airplanes, forts, even an Eiffel Tower!
New Year’s Eve, we cover a piece of cardboard with aluminum foil for a base, and begin our
creations. We pair a younger child with an older person to do the building. When the structures
are made and the candy is “glued” on (with frosting), the extra candy can be discreetly thrown
out! The prized houses are photographed and admired for a couple of days and then given away
sometimes, or gradually eaten a bit and the rest thrown away.
My daughter’s family was successful, one year, in letting each of her children eat a few pieces of
candy Halloween night, then pooling all the candy together in a single bucket to save for their
candy houses. It worked out well. That year, the pool of candy was brought out to decorate
houses, and then the rest thrown out. The next year, however, the consensus was that each child
wanted to keep his own bag. So, this time she labeled bags and saved them on top of the fridge. It
wasn't until the houses were underway that she insisted all share all the candy for their creations.
5. Count it
The Richards family counts their candy. In fact, each year, they try to break their old record of
how many pieces they can collect. A family of many children of all ages, they can collect quite a
bit. Dad is probably the most enthusiastic about this tradition, and roots them on to see if they
can break the standing record. But wonderfully, the kids have learned not to be selfish about
their own candy. They come home and dump it out all together, then have a great time sorting
and grouping and counting all that candy. At first, tears were shed about this practice of pooling
it all, but then it became routine, and all are fine with it. The candy goes in food storage buckets
and is hidden. Only Daddy knows where it is! A little bit comes out at a time, to go in the
children’s lunches. Each child can pick one chocolate and one or two other pieces to put in his
own lunch.
6. Share it!
When the Ingrams asked their children what ideas they had for Halloween night (wanting to
limit so much candy from too much trick-or-treating), the 11-year old son came up with idea of
sharing some of the candy at the Nursing home. A call to the Nursing home got them
permission to give each resident only one piece of candy. When they arrived, the residents were
delighted to see the children in their costumes. The youngest kids were the very best at gladly
passing out their candy, sharing it generously. As the family approached one bedroom door far
in the back of the facility, there lay a lady all dressed up from head to toe in a witch costume,
lying flat in bed. No one was there with her and it appeared that she couldn’t move by herself
nor talk. On her nightstand sat a bowl of treats. The Ingrams wished her a Happy Halloween
and complemented her for such a neat costume. After they gave her piece of candy and filed out,
they wondered, what if no one had come to see her that night? They were so grateful to have
shared Halloween with this grandma.
7. Buy it from the Kids.
The Bybee family buys the candy from the kids. Five dollars to spend is a great price to pay, they figure, to have all of it gone! The kids love that much money--better than a bag of candy! And that way, the candy gets dumped into the garbage, and there is no more worry about sugar or cavities or
“the gimme’s”!
8. Pick an Alternative to Trick or Treating
The Talbot family has chosen not to do Halloween. Callie had been a dental assistant before she
was married and was not big on sugar. She didn’t like the “give me treats” selfishness. One time
they talked to their kids about every holiday and Why we celebrated it. When they came to
Halloween, “well it was easy for them to see we didn’t need to be celebrating it!” Oh, they didn’t
forbid their children from dressing up for school or for the neighborhood get-together. And they
still dressed up for Grandma’s get-together with the cousins the Sunday before. But on the
actual night of Halloween, the family would plan something else fun. When their children were
all at home, they planned a trip to an amusement park at that time of year. They were glad to
miss the school parties with all the candy, as well as the evening. They found the amusement
parks fairly empty, and had such a good time together. Later on, they would plan to turn off all
the lights at home, and all go out to dinner, then miniature golfing or bowling or to see a play.
One year, they took a trip to explore the southern part of their state.
How do you manage Halloween Candy? Share your ideas by commenting below, or all
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