Halloween is over.
This always inspires quite a few dilemmas around here.
-Dilemma #1: how early does one begin playing Christmas music? (the correct answer is 9pm on October 31, when trick-or-treating is finished)
-Dilemma #2: what do we do with all this candy??? My favorite solution is, of course, to eat most of it. But when you have fun trick-or-treating neighborhoods full of children and families, and when you have children who approach trick-or-treating like it’s their job (why do they not do homework with half this much zeal? That would be lovely), you end up with a ton of candy. We eat plenty of it, I can assure you. But then we need to do other things as well.
1.) Donate it.
My favorite solution is to donate our leftovers. Our dentist pays the kids $1 per pound to bring him their candy, and he packages it up and sends it to troops overseas. The kids’ P.E. teacher had a similar trade-in program. Here are a few suggestions for places to donate your candy.
I also donated some to the kids’ teachers to use for class treats and prizes. This year, I was lucky to receive some Wonder Ball candy treats to hand out on Halloween, along with this fun house for the neighborhood kids to try!
I had some extra Wonder Ball candy, which comes with stickers and toys, and the kids’ teachers were thrilled to have these treats to put in their class treasure boxes. Now I’m the class hero – and the kids not only get a little chocolate, but they get a toy or some stickers as well.
2.) Bake or cook with it.
Snickers hot chocolate, y’all. Or toss some chopped up candy into brownies or cookies. Mix things like Skittles or M&Ms into popcorn and have a movie night treat. So many possibilities.
3.) Decorate with it.
Christmas is fast approaching – save some of your candy to use for gingerbread house decorating! Or make a candy wreath with your leftovers.
Do you have any suggestions for what to do with leftover candy? I’d love to hear more ideas!
Thanks to Wonder Ball and Frankford Candy for providing the Halloween candy and decorations!
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