“Mmmm… Mommy!”
Chomp. Chomp.
“Mmmm… mmm… ” Chomp. “Yum!”
“Mommy, this… ”
Swallow.
“This is better than chocolate!”
–My 4-year-old daughter after eating her first Fig Newton.
Now you see why I warmly embrace the whole non-edible goodie giveaway on Halloween night. My daughter is by no means a candyaholic and would happily choose a bowl of fresh fruit or a Fig Newton over a chocolate peanut butter cup or lollipop any day.
(I consider this due reward for having birthed a child who didn’t sleep through the night until she was almost 3.)
On Halloween my daughter would rather drag home a bag brimming with toys than bite-sized chocolate bars. (Daddy would be disappointed, though I’m sure he’d get out it once he realized how much he stood to save on dentist bills.)
But alas, not every child is like my own dear, sweet, fig-loving offspring. So when Halloween rolls around those parents are forced to get creative to limit the amount of candy their child consumes from the time the first Twix bar hits the bottom of their plastic pumpkin until the last Twizzler is carefully squeezed in between the mini pack of Starburst and the king-sized Snickers bar.
The countdown to Halloween is on… so let the parental bargaining begin.
Have you heard of the “switch witch?” I hadn’t either until last year when a mom from my daughter’s dance class explained the following:
Once her two daughters hit up the neighbors and eat a few pieces of their Halloween haul they come home and create a pile of treats for the “switch witch,” who is a cross between the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus.
The “switch witch” visits during the middle of the night, takes the Halloween candy and replaces it with a toy. The more Halloween candy the kids leave out for the “switch witch” the bigger the toy they get in exchange.
Another bargaining tool some parents find very effective is cold hard cash.
Scoff if you like, but I know some parents who actually buy their children’s Halloween candy and both sides agree that they are better off for doing so.
My cousin has two boys ages 7 and 9. She lets them trick-or-treat around the neighborhood; they come home, look through their bags, sort their candy and then the bargaining begins.
My cousin and her husband pay a dime for each piece of candy the boys don’t particularly care for (but would eat anyway) and a quarter for the items they love. The kids can keep as much of their Halloween candy as they want or they can sell it all and use the money to buy a new toy, video game, magazine, book, etc.
Then there’s my fellow blogger Tristi, who recently revealed that she makes a trade with her sugar sensitive son—his sugar saturated Halloween treats for candy that is sugar-free.
What kind of bargaining do you do with your kids on Halloween?
Related Articles:
Parents Who Don’t Give Out Candy on Halloween
Halloween Candy Competition Among Parents
Halloween Candy-Yours, Mine, Ours
Parents and Halloween: Scary Stuff!
Halloween and Young Children: Trick or Treat?
Pumpkinpalooza–Attack of the Parental Paparazzi
Halloween Photo Tips—Shooting Your Little Pumpkins
Are you Raising a Mini Fashionista?