Halloween should be fun, right? Like since I have a son who is about to age out of Halloween - okay, he really did age out but went out anyway - and a daughter who's still young enough to enjoy it, I should be having fun, right?
But no, at our house there's the Battle of the Halloween Candy. And it starts before Halloween, quiets down to a lull on the day of Halloween (kids out hunting for more candy to fill up our coffers) and then continues after Halloween.
First problem: we buy a gigantic bag of candy from Costco ahead of time that contains only the good stuff - M&Ms (peanut and regular), Kit Kats, Baby Ruths, Reece's Peanut Butter Cups. The good stuff.
Then there's the second problem: the family wants to eat it all. I mean, they don't want to eat it all and end up pretending we're not home on Halloween, they want us to keep buying those bags over and over again for the next nine days.
The third problem: the children are distrustful of my husband, believing he'll devour all the best stuff and my husband is distrustful of the children since he, of course, both wants the best stuff and doesn't want them to eat anything. He might talk sanctimoniously about cavities but really he just doesn't want to share. Or buy another bag for fourteen bucks.
And that's only before Halloween.
Then the kids trick or treat and bring home more candy. And it turns out we don't run out of candy because I - the neurotic mother - did buy an extra bag. And then we pool it all and there's like a mountain of candy. And then they're off and fighting again.
So, each year, I get pulled into the fray. Mainly because I don't eat candy or chocolate or, really, anything fun at all, I'm as neutral as Switzerland, as placid as Lake Geneva. So both sides trust me with the candy. I'm the human form of an Armistice. I'm told to hide the candy - how does one hide a gigantic bowl of candy? -and then I have to parcel it out to each of them at three pieces per day.
Eventually they'll forget it, of course. (Except Husband. He'll remember it no matter what.) And then months will go by; I'll throw it out when it's down to Red Hots, black Licorice and Nerds. And then, suddenly, it will be September again, a little Fall in the air, gigantic bags of candy at Costco and I will buy a bag ahead of time. Again.
Do you save the treats for Halloween or indulge ahead of time? Does anyone special have to be in charge of "hiding" the candy in your house? Do you buy what you like or what you don't like? Any non-celebrators of Halloween out there?
I have to buy the candy the night before or it is raided by my hooligans...and I include myself in that description. lol.
ReplyDeletethe kids hide their candy from tim and I cause I go through and find the milk duds and tim goes through and finds the snickers.
Im reading and listening and KNOWING the coming years will not be as easy as the five thus far. Mine could take or leave the candy at this point.
ReplyDeleteand if you even WHISPER youd trade her haul for a PRINCESS BARBIE shes in the car waiting for the drive to Target :)
I can remember hoarding candy when I was little. I knew that my parents went through and ate the good stuff when I was in bed. My kids have already largely forgotten about the giant witch's cauldron full of candy on the counter and I will end up doing what I do every year... sending it all to work with my husband. Nothing like fueling up our country's young airmen with loads of candy, right?
ReplyDeleteMy kids forget about the candy within a week, and then I stealthily throw it all away. Thank goodness.
ReplyDeleteYep, been there and done that. Next year we'll have an empty nest and since we got no trick-or-treaters this year, I think our candy days are going to be over:)
ReplyDeleteWe buy two big bags. One for us and one for the trick or treaters. There's more fighting than candy though.
ReplyDeleteI'm just impressed that you stay away from the goods - way to go!
ReplyDeleteThis is so funny! We are lucky because Genevieve can't really have candy or she will never eat anything else (1 years old) and McKenzie will share all day long (yeah for being 6). We all have our favorites and they are not the same. Peace in the house and chocolate in the belly. Great reservation Linda! Heather
ReplyDeleteI can't believe you don't eat the candy. We eat way too much leading up to Halloween and then I let them eat as much as possible the few days afterwards so I can make sure I scrub their teeth down well and we can go back to regular, non sugar high life.
ReplyDeleteFunny for some reason we think the ONLY time of the year we can "get" candy is on Halloween. HELLO...it turns out we can buy this stuff all year long.
ReplyDeleteBelieve it or not it is my 2.5 year old who has no self control. When my older son was two, he got maybe 4 or 5 pieces of candy total, because we were good parents then. Now that my older son is 5-he "gets" trick-or-treating and wants to hit as many houses as possible, and as such so does the two year old. So we have mountains of candy at home. 5 year old has some self control and listens when mom says on piece. 2 year old... not so much.
ReplyDeleteChris, I am way too neurotic to buy the candy the night before. What if they ran out! And, let me tell you, before I was in my program, there could never even BE enough Mounds or Almond Joys to fill me up. Luckily, my son somehow hates coconut!
ReplyDeleteMiz, yea! A Barbie lover! And that's always better than chocolate, right? I can't tell you how many Barbies I stored up for my daughter only to have her scorn Barbies when she got to be the right age. How could a kid resist the little outfits, the perfect shoes, the houses? Even at my age sometimes I want to play!
ReplyDeleteJennifer, I'm still parcelling ours out, though tonight they talked me into five pieces each (well some were those eensy weensy mini bars...) And I'll be watching the news for some sugared up airmen out of New Jersey to see what we have you to thank for!
ReplyDeleteTKW, you're so good. So there's like no way I can actually turn this into a Kitchen Witch meal? I was hoping...
ReplyDeleteKaren, if you buy candy anyway next year then you know who it's for! Today I saw a lady at Walgreens just buying bags and bags of Halloween candy and I thought that you can't save it for next year and even if you want to eat candy would you want to eat such tiny little bars?
ReplyDeleteLisa, twins again: two gigantic Costco bags, one for the family before Halloween and one for the trick or treaters. What we don't ever take into account, though, is how much stuff the kids will come home with a dump into the community pot!
ReplyDeleteLisa S - This is my 11th Halloween with no candy! It's hard to believe! I once couldn't stay on a diet for a day and now it's been 10 years and 14 weeks of none of that stuff!
ReplyDeleteHey Heather, thanks for visiting! I think if my family would just stop fighting over the candy long enough to think about it they'd realize they all like different candy too! But they must have gotten the "there's never enough" syndrome from me!
ReplyDeleteCharlotte, And here's the mystery of the kid teeth: how do they eat almost identical foods/candy and yet one kid will get tons of cavities and another will get none? Or maybe it's one of those sneaky kids, like my daughter, who say their brushing their teeth but just go in the bathroom and get the sink wet!
ReplyDeleteMichelle, don't you think that we're all trying to live out our "ghosts of Halloween pasts" in some way? Like will anything ever bring back the thrill of being a kid and knowing that for one night you can knock on a STRANGER'S door and get candy from them? Ahhh!
ReplyDeleteGetrealmommy, it's like they either have the internal sugar addict switch or they don't, right? This is what I love: my son is eating something he got that was full-size (yes, he got something full-size!) and he can't finish it. I have to say, that never happened to me!
ReplyDeleteI solved this dilemma by moving way out of town on 2.5 acres. No Trick-or-treaters = no candy ahead of time.
ReplyDelete:)
Oh, you're so funny, Linda!
ReplyDeleteI wait until the last minute to buy the candy (one or two days before)... I have a tendency to nibble.
My boys always considered trick-or-treating a competitive sport. They and friends ended up laying out their sacks of booty and counting, piece by piece - to see who had the most!
I think they may have enjoyed that more than eating it! (OK, they liked eating it too. And again, yours truly "nibbled"...)
We didn't even buy candy this year. Sob. Everything was just so...busy. Hey, there's always next year!
ReplyDeleteElizabeth, now that is the way to raise kids. I'm majorly jealous. When I think that I've blown my kids' childhoods on this pint-sized lot with my neighbors' houses bearing down on me and nothing to look at in the backyard but a bunch of block wall fences it can honestly make me cry!
ReplyDeleteBLW, I love the idea of trick or treating as a competitive sport! I used to do this really complex sorting thing with the kids, back when I used to eat hard candy and lollipops. It'd be a pile of "what mom can eat" (that stuff), what they can eat (a mountain), and the stuff no one can stand (the rest). But I think we just did it because sorting candy is fun!
ReplyDeleteAmber, See how you can fool the kids when they're young? They only know what you tell them, right? And when you live in an apartment, which I think you do, it's not like there are going to be a lot of trick or treaters. Either way, I won't wait for your Halloween post!
ReplyDeleteThis is just TOO funny! I learned years ago to hand out Tootsie Rolls at Halloween because they are my favorite and no one else in my family gives a flip about them. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteI'm impressed that you don't eat the candy. If we did Halloween, I would not have the willpower to stay away from the chocolate. As a rule, I try to keep it out of the house. My big sweets challenge is around Purim time, when our house becomes overrun with yummy treats...a month or so before Pesach. So, really, I have to eat them all. It's chametz. What can I do? ;)
ReplyDeleteDave and Tami, I wish I could say I was that good back when I ate candy. I was such a pig that I only bought what I liked and hid it away for myself! Yes, the trick or treaters could have tootsie rolls, but, hey, tootsie rolls were never a binge food of mine!
ReplyDeleteRivki, I'm glad you brought up Pesach because it's a much bigger problem for me eating-wise. I mean, I don't eat sweets so the Hamantaschen at Purim wouldn't find its way into my mouth, but I've got to tell you, I'm not sure I can make it through another seder without eating all the charoses in the house!
ReplyDeleteThis coming Pesach I'm going to have to make a walnut-free charoses for me and kugle with no nuts. It's seems kind of sacreligious. Can you make a charoses without nuts?