Halloween is well known to be a sugar bonanza. From trick-or-treating hauls of candy to Halloween party tables stacked high with iced cookies, there’s no end to the sugary delights of this spooky holiday. Of course, it’s also the first holiday in the great holiday season challenge to stay healthy. How can you align your health goals with an entire month that’s all about candy and treats? It’s easier than you think.
You might be surprised to learn that a healthy Halloween is only a few smart choices away. Whether you’re trying to stick to your own fitness goals or want to help your children avoid that inevitable sugar crash, we have a few clever healthy Halloween tricks and treats to share.
Healthy Halloween Party Hosting
Halloween parties start as early as mid-October and your party might be the bash of the season. Inviting a few friends or the whole neighborhood, you can surprise your guests and have a healthier Monster Mash with just a few fun changes to the party plan.
Spooky Fruit on the Snack Table
If you absolutely love decorating Halloween treats for the yearly party, you can still set your creativity free. But instead of using cookies and cupcakes as your canvas, start with fresh fruit. Craft banana ghosts, tangerine pumpkins, pretzel spiders, toothy apples, franken-kiwis, strawberry mummies, and peanut butter spiders. You can still use chocolate and marshmallows – but the fruit base will boost the health of your whole snack table.
For savory snacks, try blue corn chips for bat wings, carrot fingers, sausage mummies, and monster kebabs.
Nefariously Nourishing Cauldron Punch
Use your smoothie blending magic to create a fruit punch that is more nutritious than it seems. Blend a witch’s brew and serve it from a cauldron. Use natural cranberry or cherry juice for a deep red color and sneak in a few healthy ingredients that will help your party roll on energetically all night long.
Stay Active with Halloween Games and Toys
Don’t forget to keep your guests active with fun Halloween themed games and toys that encourage active play. Even adults will throw around frizbees and dive into hula hoop contests given a fun party vibe.
The Trick-or-Treating Workout
Speaking of physical activity, Halloween is the single best holiday to get in your steps. Whether you’re taking the kids trick-or-treating or you’re hitting the dance floor, make plans to work up a healthy sweat this spooky season.
Wear Action-Ready Costumes with Sneakers
Put on costumes that are action-ready. Choose light, breathable materials. Make sure hemlines are short enough for walking and running. For decorative pieces, choose foam over plastic for flexibility. Choose partial masks, face paint, and hair pieces over full masks, and keep the doorway-wide decor to a minimum. And don’t forget the sneakers. Good sneakers can make for a fantastic active holiday.
Power-Walk the Neighborhood
If you’re going trick-or-treating, make plans to take the neighborhood by storm. Coach the kids you are escorting (whether your children, nieces and nephews, friends’ younger siblings, or even grandkids) to be prepared for action. Practice power walking at a pace that is intense but not too tough for everyone in your party.
Plan Your Route by Streets and Blocks
Plan your route ahead of time. Walk, don’t drive, to explore the whole neighborhood. Plan the streets and blocks you will explore and enjoy the exercise.
Preventing the Sugar Crash
What about all that candy from trick-or-treating? Everyone has the instinct to dive directly into the plastic pumpkin for their favorite treats, sometimes before you even get home. But wait. If you don’t want a stomach ache and a sugar crash, you can plan ahead for a healthier haul.
Carry a Smaller Pumpkin
Start by leaving the pillow cases and oversized buckets behind. Stock up on smaller trick-or-treating pumpkins (and other fun shapes) so that you’re less tempted to overstock.
Eat Dinner Before Candy-Collecting
Make sure everyone eats a filling and healthy dinner before you hit the neighborhood streets. Not being hungry can minimize the temptation for candy-gorging before you get home, and make it easier to wait.
Count Your Haul and Divide the Spoils
One of the best ways to help kids wait to eat all their candy once you get home is to make a tradition of displaying, trading, and dividing the candy on the kitchen table. This is especially useful for children with food allergies and strong preferences. Kids can trade away the candy they don’t want for favorites that aren’t high on their sibling/cousins/friends candy priorities.
The most in-demand candies (usually the chocolates) can also be split fairly so no one misses out on a favorite due to bad luck. This is also a good time to take your “parent tax” and extract a few candies from each pile for later.
Allow X Pieces of Candy Before Bed
Define how many pieces of candy can be eaten before bed – and respect your own rule. Let each child pick a few pieces and then put the rest away. This can prevent candy gorging while still enjoying the spoils of the holiday.
Save the Candy Stash for Later
Give your kids a reason to save their candy for later. Explain the delights of having two pieces of candy every night for the next three months. You can also invent ways to use the candy in at-home baking or save it for gingerbread house decorating supplies.
At Home: Pass Out Tangerines and Toys
If you are on door duty on Halloween, consider how to make the day a little healthier (but still fun) for the costumed kids who ring your doorbell. Instead of candy, be the cool house that gives out toys instead. Glow sticks, miniature bubble bottles, bouncy balls, temporary tattoos, and stick-on jewelry are all fun to play with when the pumpkins are upturned at the end of the night. Plus, that one spider ring that’s always in the pumpkin has to come from somewhere.
You can also add fruit like tangerines, which are sturdy and come with their own wrapper.
Happy Healthy Halloween from Merritt Clubs
In addition to making Halloween a little healthier, staying on your workout game is always a good plan for the holiday season. You can enjoy your favorite machines and routines or join a festive fitness class at Merritt Clubs to help you maintain your health goals while enjoying the occasional holiday cookie and candy stash. Happy healthy Halloween!
