What do you hand out at Halloween?

[ourbabygirl]

A certain candy?
Coins?
Stickers?
Another novelty?

The last couple of years I've done a combination of glow bracelets and candy (avoid the nummy chocolate ones because I would devour them before & after Halloween)... just wondering what you do. :)

[BabyBearsMom]

:bag Nothing. When people come to the door, our dog goes nuts and we don't want the barking to wake DD up. So we just turn off all the nights and hang out in the family room down in the basement. I feel like we are the crappiest neighbors but the children in the neighborhood are scared of our dogs (he is a chihuahua, so not scary to look at, but he barks at everything and everyone).

[fauve01]

that last couple years, i've bought the barrell of individual bags of halloween pretzels from Costco. it's what i want my dd to get instead of candy!

ETA: looks like this
http://www.samsclub.com/sams/shop/product.jsp?productId=prod720718

[rolypoly27]

Nothing this year. Last year I had a bunch of candy waiting by the door and not one single kid came knocking on our door. Not a single knock. So I'm not wasting my money on anything for Halloween, except for a costume for DD. She's too young for trick-or-treating, but we'll dress her up and take pictures.

[amldaley]

We buy a mixed bag, a couple of chocolate bags and then we buy the big bag of individual packets of teddy grahams or gold fish.

We give nice kids and parents chocolate. We give the snotty teens who dress like thugs and really have no business ToT'ing the mixed candy and we give little kids the grahams/fish.

[rlu]

Chocolate for the most part. We buy the types of candy we like.

Individual bags of goldfish for the little ones

candy none of us want from DS's ToT bag (if it isn't given out that night, it goes to work)

lights out around 9

[emily]

We just pick up the big mixed bag of chocolates at Costco (because that's what we like) :)

We dont get many TOT so we always have tons of leftovers.

[Seitvonzu]

when we did candy i did chocolate mostly. last year i wanted to give out glow bracelets, but dh thought that was terrible. so i bought a 50 pk of lik-m-aid and the rest was the glow bracelets and gave older kids a choice. it was about 1/2 and 1/2 ...once the candy was gone, everyone was happy enough with their bracelet... we cracked them then and there. everyone seemed to like that :)

this year i bought a bunch of funsize playdoh to give out when it was on clearance last year. i also bought more of the lik-m since it was so popular :) i prefer to give out non-candy. we don't usually have tons left over, but it gets REALLY expensive (we live in a townhouse communcity and it's super popular to come here.)

[starmommy]

Ring pops for older kids (because I won't eat them)
pretzels for younger

I try and minimize candy in the house to cut down on temptation, and my husband goes out the day after Halloween to buy candy 50% off and loves to tell me what a deal he got.

[waitingforgrace]

Candy, mix of cholate and fruity stuff like skittles.

[TwinFoxes]

Candy, candy, candy. I'm no Scrooge. I'm talking Reeses, Trader Joe's chocolate bars, Snickers. Yummy stuff. If parents don't want their kids to have candy on Halloween they should keep them at home, take it from them, or have some sort of sticker and pretzel party at their own house. :) (Just kidding, there's nothing wrong with stickers and pretzels).

I'm not a big sweets person, so it's not a big temptation for me. DH is a biiiiiiig sweets person, but he goes between a 31" and 32" waist, so no big deal. We just ration it for the girls.

[fortato]

CANDY! HANDFULS OF IT!

DH wants to give out full sized candy bars, but we get too many kids for that, and it's harder to slip the empty wrapper to the older, non costumed kids when the bar is big.

[marie]

that last couple years, i've bought the barrell of individual bags of halloween pretzels from Costco. it's what i want my dd to get instead of candy!

ETA: looks like this
http://www.samsclub.com/sams/shop/product.jsp?productId=prod720718

:yeahthat: and Utz are very clearly labeled for allergens (one of the few pretzel brands that DD1 can eat).

I also pick up the little cans of playdoh at Costco.

We're rural so there isn't much (any?) door-to-door TOTing town wide. Instead, the school gathers treats from whoever wants to donate and then they distribute it to the residents along Main Street, which is closed for TOTing.

[momof2girls]

we do the little play dohs from Costco just b/c I don't want to have the temptation of candy in the house. It seems to go over well and is relatively inexpensive. It's something like $10 for 80 mini cans.

[Pear]

We give candy that we love so if there are any leftovers we can enjoy them. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Snickers, and 3 Musketeers. Occasionally I get a bag of Nerds too.

[NewfieNat]

Packets of hot chocolate. Kids usually love it but we get a few who say, "Coffee?"

[mommylamb]

We usually go trick or treating in a friend's neighborhood, and rarely get many if any trick or treaters at our house anyway. We live in a townhouse complex and you have to walk up a flight of stairs to get to our front door. Honestly, the kids are kind of lazy and go to the houses across the street, which have the front door at the ground level.

When we lived in our last house, pre-DS, I used to give out reces peanut butter cups because I hate peanut butter and wouldn't be tempted by it. But now that I'm more sensitive to peanut allergies, I imagine I would get gummy bears and chocolates to have a variety that kids could choose for. But again, we tend to not be home for Halloween anyway.

[karstmama]

kristen, that is slick!

usually tootsie rolls when i lived somewhere with actual tot-ers. now mainly quarters because nobody ever comes here.

[artvandalay]

Candy, but I only buy candy that I do not like. I have no self control when it comes to sweets!

Plus my middle child doesn't like chocolate, so guess who eats all the chocolate from his stash? :bag:

[alien_host]

In the past I did a mix....full sized Hershey Bars (OK for nut allergies), last year I got a box of full sized skittles/starbursts at Costco. I also add playdough cans, Utz's pretel bags and other stuff to the bowl.

Or I make little treat bags with tattoos and candy.

Last year I had older kids grabbing 2-3 full sized bars so to stop that I'm not letting kids pick this year. I do like for the little kids to pick.

[arivecchi]

Candy, candy, candy. I'm no Scrooge. I'm talking Reeses, Trader Joe's chocolate bars, Snickers. Yummy stuff. If parents don't want their kids to have candy on Halloween they should keep them at home, take it from them, or have some sort of sticker and pretzel party at their own house. :) Go big or go home! ;)

We give out lots of chocolates.

[fortato]

Did anyone else have parents that gave out pennies?

It was so embarrassing to have to be "that family". Of course, they gave out pennies, but always ate the 5th Avenues when I brought them home....

[DrSally]

that last couple years, i've bought the barrell of individual bags of halloween pretzels from Costco. it's what i want my dd to get instead of candy!

ETA: looks like this
http://www.samsclub.com/sams/shop/product.jsp?productId=prod720718

:yeahthat: love those and peanut free.

[sweetsue98]

toothbrushes and kids toothpaste:rotflmao:

Not sure if the kids liked it.....

[justlearning]

For our church party, we buy candies that kids with nut allergies (like DS) could have, so we usually give skittles, starbursts, and organic lollipops.

On Halloween, I think we'll do the same thing this year as we did last year--turn off our lights and hang out in our basement. The reason is that our neighborhood has become well known for going all-out for Halloween. People create haunted houses and let strangers walk through them, etc. so we get a ton of kids from other parts of town being dropped off in ours to go trick-or-treating. To me, that ruins the spirit of it--I'm very happy to pass out candy to neighborhood kids but don't want to have to spend $100 or more to have enough candy to pass out to kids from all over town for hours.

[SnuggleBuggles]

1 bowl with candy (big old bag of Costco chocloate lovers' mix!)
1 bowl with stickers, play-doh and Cheddar Bunnies

I usually put the sticker bowl out when little ones come by though the teens really like that stuff too!

Beth

[hwin708]

I buy the big mixes of chocolate candy bars, and let them grab whatever they can handle. We don't get that many trick or treaters, so I'm happy to hand it out by the boatload. Big size candy bars may be exciting for them, but they're not as exciting for me to keep shoveling it into their bags, lol.

Whatever is left over gets bagged up with the kids' candy and donated the next day. The kids know Halloween is just for one night, then all the treats are done and out. So I just drop it all in the donation bin at my gym the next day.

[TwinFoxes]

toothbrushes and kids toothpaste:rotflmao:

Not sure if the kids liked it.....

And with a name like sweet sue... :shake:

;)

[KpbS]

Smarties and sweettarts--two candies my FA kids love.

[g-mama]

Chocolate: Twix, Kit Kat, Milky Way, M&Ms, etc.

I have to delay buying until the day or two before so I don't eat it all myself and have to rebuy.

[lizzywednesday]

Last year, I gave out mini tubs of Play-Doh.

The year before, I sent DH out for candy. I think it was a bunch of mini candy bars.

The year before that, I got Smarties, Nerds & Dum Dums due to the high numbers of little kids on the street - I was afraid to hand out anything with peanuts!

This year, I'm looking for another non-food or non-sugary treat for the smaller kids, while we'll get Kit Kats or something for the bigger kids.

[longtallsally05]

Candy! DH insists on handing out "the good stuff" only, aka stuff WE'D want to eat: snickers, kit kat, smarties, reese's PBCs etc. We really got into the swing of Halloween when we lived on a military base overseas. Halloween there is CRAZY. I gave out 36 bags (yes, BAGS, not pieces) of candy in two hours. It was lots of fun, totally safe, policed by security forces, all the on-base kids + off base invitees. Haven't seen anything like it since we've been back in the States so we usually end up eating about half of our candy stash after Halloween.

[lizzywednesday]

Did anyone else have parents that gave out pennies?

It was so embarrassing to have to be "that family". Of course, they gave out pennies, but always ate the 5th Avenues when I brought them home....

I may be in the minority, but I always looked forward to the folks who'd give handfuls of change on Halloween. Some years, I'd end up with up to $5, depending on which route we took!

The ones I really hated were the people who gave out apples. Really? Apples? And they were McIntosh ... I'm not a big fan of McIntosh apples.

[artvandalay]

toothbrushes and kids toothpaste:rotflmao:

Not sure if the kids liked it.....

Holy cr*p my son would love your house. He LOVES that sort of stuff. He has a wierd obsession with toothpaste and toothbrushes. He will stand in front of the toothpaste isle forever picking one out. He gets really excited to try new toothpaste and getting a new toothbrush just sends him over the edge :hysterical:

Already for Christmas he is asking for a spin brush. I think I will also get him some sort of small toiletry kit for his little overnight trips, because he loves packing up his toothbrush and toothpaste when he goes somewhere, but he usually just uses a ziplock baggie type thing.

[smilequeen]

When we lived in a neighborhood with trick or treaters we gave out chocolate...Hershey bars, kit kats, reese's cups. I won't give out anything sticky (starbursts, gummy bears, skittles, etc.). I do think Halloween is for candy though, so I give out the least tooth destroying stuff, which is chocolate. I refuse to be like the dentist who lived up the street for me as a kid. He gave out toothbrushes and little toys and we hated him.

[DrSally]

YEah, I do agree that the sticky stuff can be quite acidic, at a PH that destroys enamel. It's tough since most of the choc stuff is not OK for DS due to allergies. I compromise w/a combo of smarties, pretzels, and playdough tubs.

ETA: my kids *love* getting toothbrushes and toothpaste!

[bubbaray]

Small-sized chocolate, one per child. We buy for 300 kids, hand it ALL out and turn out our light before the kids have gone home.

We hand out the stuff with peanuts and buy the peanut-free stuff for our girls to trade us when they get home.