Countdown to candy day. Whether you’ve chosen to go the non-candy route (see Halloween Planning for some alternatives to candy for trick-or-treaters) or the candy bar route, if you’ve got kids, you’re going to have a big bag of candy coming into your house Saturday night.
Parents seem to have a variety of strategies on this one:
- Let the kiddos gorge themselves. Nothing teaches a lesson like an aching belly.
- One night of gorging, then the bag mysteriously disappears.
- Candy doled out at sub-lethal rate.
But for many of us, the candy just ends up in the trash. For such a sustainable-minded community, that seems a shame.
One option is offered by dentist Keith Wong: he will once again be teaming up with businesses for the annual Halloween Candy Buyback. He’ll “purchase” unwrapped candy from kids at $1 per pound, and all candy collected will be donated to Operation Gratitude,a non-profit that includes the candy in holiday care packages sent to American servicemen and women stationed overseas.
All trick-or-treaters who turn in their unwanted sweets will receive goodie bags for their teeth (think toothbrushes, floss, and fun stuff).
So stop by the Starbucks upstairs in the Wallingford QFC the Saturday following Halloween, November 7th, 10am -noon with your kids bags of candy. Think of how delighted they’ll be when they find out they get a toothbrush and floss in return!
“Think of how delighted they’ll be when they find out they get a toothbrush and floss in return!”
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That statement was meant to be sarcastic, right? What kid in their right mind would want a toothbrush and dental floss for Halloween…? Sheesh. What a buzzkill. Most parents I know parcel the goodies out at the “non-lethal” rate you mentioned and that seems to work just fine. Especially when they brush and floss afterwards, win-win?
More enjoyment and fewer behavioral problems if the candy is mixed with equal parts vodka.
Hey, Donn, that’s my kind of Halloween, tricks and treats hahahahahahaha?
I’m planning to just toss in splits. Vodka, bourbon, rum, and gin. Happy kids, or parents!
Food banks will also take donations. They bag them up and give them to clients who can’t afford gifts for the kids. We let our son pick out candy to keep and candy for the food bank. Then, we add whatever leftovers we have from the bowl. It’s a nice project and it gives him a chance to think about others in a highly personal way.
Our grandkids are fortunate to be on the Switch Witch’s route. They leave all but a few choice selections from their Halloween haul in a bag that night and she happily exchanges them for a gift the whole family will enjoy more than multiple days living with sugar-high kids.
She’s been known to leave the candy bags, along with undelivered handouts, in the bus shelters at the freeway overpass. Somehow gifting that quantity of candy to the food bank seemed mean.