Halloween candy substitutes

[KBecks]

I am thinking of giving little boxes of raisins. But, I don't want my house egged. I'm definitely doing raisins if we go to the MOMs club party. Other ideaas? Quarters? $1s?

[JBaxter]

I did find Organic, dye free lollipops and gummy bears. I have also gotten individual bags of animal crackers and cheeze cubes

[brittone2]

We are doing stickers and little tubs of play doh (probably two tubs per bag). Costco has 80 packs of the small play doh containers for $10. AC Moore just had (maybe still have the sale going on?) tablets of Halloween stickers for 50 cents each (I cut up the individual sheets into smaller sections). I may add some organic fruit roll ups to each bag yet. Still trying to decide (Costco has had the Fruitabu stuff, not sure if it is still there). I also picked up a ton of crayons for really cheap during the back to school sales. If you can still snag some at 10 or 20 cents a pack, that is a nice non food addition.

[newnana]

Big hits at our house include:
juice boxes
stickers
individually wrapped pretzel packs
eye patches (it was a joke one year and turned out to be a big hit, I don't know why)

[Java]

We did glow bracelets last year and it was a HUGE hit. I had parents thanking me for thinking of this and kids coming over saying "my friend told me you were giving out glow bracelets" and "so this is where everyone's getting their bracelets!"

It was really neat to see all the kids marching by across the street with their glow bracelets and knowing that it came from my house. DH came back with DS from trick or treating and he said that the whole area was marked with the bracelets.

www.sureglow.com sells them in bundle of 100 for I think $0.11 each. I ordered 300 last year for $30 and I almost ran out. The more you order, the cheaper it is.

[supercalifragilous]

Sam's Club had boxes of snack-sized microwave popcorn last year and we've been giving those out for the last 2 years. Whatever leftovers I have, I take to the office with me and I don't feel so guilty about eating it! It's actually the perfect size for a snack b/c I can never manage to finish a whole bag off by myself anyway!

Another dentist alternative - toothbrushes! I used to roll my eyes as a kid, but as a mom, I like it!

[Fairy]

Yeah, I'd nix the raisins, too. Forget the bucks, that's gonna get steep. We did play-doh last year, also, from costco, and it was a hit with every age group. Toddlers all the way up to high schoolers, we were loved and adored. Gonna do it again this year, too! Good luck. I like that glow bracelet idea, too, tho, I think I'm gonna look into that.

[bubbaray]

For the trick-or-treaters, how many kids do you get? We buy for 300 kids (not a typo) and end up turning out our lights before the kids go home (people from out of the area BUS their kids to our neighborhood, sigh). I buy the cheapest candy I can find for them, seeing as how I really do NOT know any of these kids!

For your MOMs club, would you reconsider the raisins idea? For the teeth, there's really no difference between raisins or candy. In fact, my dentist says chocolate is better as a treat b/c parents make more of an effort to brush the kids teeth after than they do with raisins (which stick to the teeth more than chocolate).

I've done bags of goldfish and bags of cookies, with stickers, for daycare treats. I've also done peanut-free chocolate (easier to find here in Canada -- I always have trouble finding it in the US) as the daycare is peanut free. I might do jello & pudding cups this year. Most of the other daycare parents seem to try to make their treats as junk-candy as possible. Sigh.


Melissa

DD#1: 04/2004

DD#2: 01/2007

[schums]

We give out packets of Kool-aid (the unsweetened kind). The kids LOVE it. We buy it when it goes on sale 10 for $1 and give 2 out to each kid. I wouldn't mind it as a parent since I can control the amount of sugar I put into it, plus it can be used for craft things too, if we don't want to drink it.

Sarah
Mom to Alex (3/2002) and Catherine (8/2003)

[SnuggleBuggles]

I have a bowl filled with candy and another filled with organic cheese cracker packages and packages of stickers. I separated them for toddlers or people with allergies. 2 years running this has gone over well and I am surprised by older kids who choose the non candy.

My dentist would prefer chocolate to raisins, btw. He's pretty anti raisins or fruit snacks.

Beth