It’s the day after Halloween and your house is filled to the brim with your kids candy haul. Not to mention all the leftovers from what you didn’t hand out. Back in the good old days we could easily bring it all to the office and it would get scooped up in no time. However, this year most of our offices are our currently at home so we need to get creative in how we get rid of the excess Halloween candy. Here’s a bunch of fun and useful ways to use that Halloween candy without letting it go to waste – or eating it all at once!
FREEZE IT
I love having chocolate stashed in my freezer. It’s there when I need it but it’s not in my face all day begging me to eat it. You can eat it as-is when a sweet tooth strikes or you can use it to add to milkshakes, sundaes, ice cream or even cookie dough.
DIY SNACK MIX OR TRAIL MIX
I can’t promise that your kids won’t just pick out the candy from the trail mix but at least there’s a chance they’ll also eat the other stuff too.
MAKE YOUR OWN FLAVORED VODKA
Check out these 11 recipes from candystore.com. They give you tips on what kind of vodka to use and how to store it. And they use everything from Skittles to Starbursts.
MAKE MOCHA COFFEE
Change up your morning routine and make that coffee into a mocha!
BAKE WITH IT
You can make some really fun and inventive brownies and cookies. Check out these great recipes we found:
Leftover Halloween Candy Cookie Dough
MAKE S’MORES
Grab a Ziploc or get fancy with cellophane and make some ready-to-go S’mores bags for fall nights by the fire pit. We love these creative twists on S’mores – especially the one with peanut butter cups.
ICE CREAM BAR
Make a weekly ice cream bar. Why does Friday have to be all about pizza? Make Fridays the new Ice Cream Bar Night and use candy as the different toppings.
CREATE A SECRET STASH
Stash *some* candy in your desk drawer or car console for sugar emergencies (for you and the kids!)
USE FOR PRESENTS
Save the bows this year and use candy to add some flair to your gifts. Fill cellophane bags with some candies and use them to decorate presents or pair with a wine bottle as a gift.
DIY THANKSGIVING COUNTDOWN CALENDAR
This is a great activity to do with your kids!
How to:
- Get a poster board or canvas and have your kids decorate it for Thanskgiving. They can all write what they’re thankful for on it.
- Tape or glue 26 dixie cups to the poster board. You can also use push pins or toothpicks.
- Write numbers 1 through 26 on each of the Dixie cups (or you can choose to use sticker numbers. You can also put Thanksgiving Day on the 26th cup)
- Parse out candy into each cup so they can each have one piece of candy leading up to Thanksgiving.
- You can use bigger cups or cover the cups so that the candy is a surprise each day.
- Be creative! You can decorate the cups with things that remind you of Thanksgiving. You can make them into turkeys, or pilgrims, or Turkey pilgrims!
THANKSGIVING PIÑATA
Why not use this year to start a new tradition of having a piñata at Thanksgiving? You’re likely to have less people at the table this year due to COVID and travel restrictions so it will be fun to change things up and make it memorable.
MAKE A GINGER BREAD HOUSE
Although I doubt anyone is handing out candy canes and gumdrops this Halloween, I’m sure you can use those chocolates for walkways and the m&ms for the roof.
SEND OVERSEAS TO SUPPORT OUR TROOPS
MAKE HOLIDAY BARK
We thought these were so cute!
FIND A LOCAL DENTIST WITH A BUY BACK PROGRAM
Here’s a few we found in our area: