I am not exactly sure how Halloween 2014 will go down for our family, but I do know it will be different than last year. My two year old son is on a special diet, called the Feingold Program (another post for another time). He is restricted from eating foods with artificial food coloring, flavorings, or preservatives. Roughly translated, this means no candy on Halloween.
As of right now, my plan is to take our kiddos trick-or-treating in our neighborhood. Once that’s over, they will be strongly encouraged to trade in their candy stash for a few small toys and other non-candy essentials. Of course, easier said than done! In lieu of passing out candy to trick-or-treaters, we will also be giving away non-candy options. So I created a list of ideas for this upcoming holiday.
Small novelty toys:
- Yo-yos
- Slinkies
- Slap bracelets
- Bubbles
- Bouncy balls
- Finger puppets
- Clackers or noise-makers
- Spinning tops
- Plastic soldiers
- Water guns
- Erasers
- Hand stampers
Anything glow in the dark:
- Necklaces and bracelets
- Glow sticks or wands
- Rubber ducks (So cute! I found these at Target.)
- Spiders
- Sticky eyeballs
- Tatoos
Non-candy food options:
- Applesauce packets
- Small boxes of raisins
- Microwavable popcorn
- Animal crackers, Teddy Grahams, or Goldfish
- Fruit leather
- Clementines or fruit cups with a “Jack O Lantern” face drawn on with a Sharpie
- Honey sticks
- Apples
- Granola bars
Below are some fun ideas that take a little more elbow grease and time, but would be fun options for a class party.
- Mini bottle of hand-santizer with a label that reads, “Germs are scary.”
- Orange Legos tied with cellophane and green ribbon to make little pumpkins. All-orange Legos are available on amazon.com.
- Here’s a recipe for cinnamon-scented pumpkin bath bombs. I have the ingredients for this craft, but we haven’t made it yet. However, the directions seem straight-forward enough for someone non-crafty like me to pull off.
What do you plan on giving out for Halloween: candy or a non-candy option?
Have you seen this? Consider having a teal pumpkin.
http://www.foodallergy.org/teal-pumpkin-project#.VEpJwaY8LCQ
Yes, I heard about the teal pumpkin idea…only where would one find a teal pumpkin? 🙂
Giving out SPIDER toys?? My niece has arachnophobia. She would be traumatized if someone put that in her trick or treat bag!! How you can be so insensitive!!!