5 Tips For A Healthy Hallows Eve!
LAURENTINE TEN BOSCH
All Hallows Eve is nearly upon us and you know what that means don’t you? Your streets will be filled with mini goblins, fairy princess and superheroes of all sorts! Your pillowcases and reusable shopping bags will be converted into carrying cases for your children’s Trick-or-Treating adventures and in turn, your house will be overflowing with refined sugars, packets of chips and a seemingly endless supply of mini chocolate bars in every variety.
It’s the highlight of the year for anyone under the age of 15 (as well as some parents with an overactive sweet tooth) and is the day dreaded by parents who fear to deal with the sugar highs and the sugar lows of their offspring. It is, however, all in good fun and that’s exactly the attitude we should all be going into it with! There’s no need to be spooked out by sugary treats entering your home and fear, not the effects they may have on your mini monsters! Like all else in life, it’s all about moderation..and a tad bit of harmless conniving. Here are a few helpful tips to ensure everyone in your family has a happy and healthy Halloween!
1. Bribing Isn’t Always Such A Bad Thing…
It is becoming more and more popular for parents to offer up more sought after treats in exchange for that hard-earned candy. Maybe they’ve had their eye on the latest LEGO craze or perhaps a night out with some of their friends to the movies is what they’re really craving? Whatever you may feel is a more valuable experience worth swapping out for some of their, it could be well worth it if it means avoiding having your child binging on a sugar overload.
2. Fill Them Up, Buttercup!
I don’t mean to literally fill them up with buttercups, come now. Trick or Treating, however, is a big night out for our little monsters, minions & witches and in many parts of the country, it may mean accessorizing their princess costumes with a winter jacket or scarf and mitts! Another great way to send them out prepared for the night’s festivities is with a full belly! Feeding them a meal that’s both healthy and hearty will help to keep their bellies full for the night and help keep snacking to a minimum. This also means a more restful; sugar high free nights sleep for the both of you!
3. Limit their exposure!
In this day in age, it seems near impossible right? Well how about introducing a new tradition to your Halloween Night this year?! Head out Trick or Treating as usual, but why not limit it to an hour or to only half the neighborhood? The kids still get to dress up, join in on the festivities and you get to limit how much candy, chips, and chocolate is making its way back into the house. One way to lure them away from the doorbells and cauldrons full of goodies is to turn the second half of the evening into an event! Once they’ve collected their sweets, announce it’s time to return home for a movie night! Have some healthy yet festive snacks on hand for them and while they watch Hocus Pocus, you can go through their loot, sorting out the bad from…the not so bad sweets, letting them pick our their favorites as well to ensure they don’t feel like you’re taking away all their hard earned loot.
4. Be Choosy
For many children, Halloween is the event of the year, the day they look forward almost more than Christmas and that child-like excitement isn’t something we want to squash. However as parents, you’ve worked so hard to introduce a healthy, well-balanced lifestyle to your children and it’s understandable to not want all that hard work to go to waste for the sake of one nights candy haul. A trick to being able to keep an eye on what sort of sweets your sweeties will be eating is to divide them up into categories: chips, chocolate, candies and misc. Once you’ve sorted through the goods, discard the ones with the most food coloring, the unwrapped candies from the stranger down the road and any others you may not deem suitable for your child. Like anything else indulgent in life, sweets should be consumed in moderation so putting a limit as to how much they can have per day will help you keep their sugar highs in check. Lead by example as well by limiting how much you dip into the candy jar as well!
5. Be The Change You Wish To See In Your Neighborhood!
Instead of hopping on the High Fructose bandwagon, why not source out some healthier options to give out to your Trick- or – Treaters? Your local health food shops may have some sugar free alternatives, mini packs of trail mix or some bottles of water to keep them hydrated while they’re out taking over the town! Or maybe even go candy-less? Why not raid your local dollar store for some bulk temporary tattoos or sticker sets?!
Whatever you and your family do to practice a healthier Halloween, just remember that with anything new and shiny, most children’s interest will fade after a week or so and life and eating habits will be back to normal for everyone within a couple of weeks. Enjoying our indulgences in moderation is something we all practice and Halloween is no exception! Enjoy the mini treats and balance it out with some of our healthy breakfasts the morning after! Enjoy yourselves and have a Happy Halloween!!
What are some of your families tricks for a healthier Halloween?
What meal do you make for your family before the Trick – or – Treating commences?
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Laurentine ten Bosch, filmmaker of Food Matters, Hungry For Change and TRANSCENDENCE - Live Life Beyond The Ordinary and founder of FMTV. Along with James Colquhoun, Laurentine founded Food Matters, giving people the tools (films, books, website, TV) to take charge of their own health. Food Matters is an internationally acclaimed widely popular documentary about the medical and healthcare industries. Their latest documentary, Hungry For Change, reveals how the diet and processed food industries are the enemies of permanent weight loss, vibrant health, and natural living. From here, FMTV was born! A place where we can access vital information by watching all of your favorite inspiring documentaries, expert interviews & recipe videos in one place.