Want a Safe and Healthy Way to Celebrate Halloween?

Did you know the average person in the US consumes 25 pounds of candy a year, much of which is consumed around Halloween? But with the growing epidemic of childhood obesity, many families are looking for more health conscious ways to celebrate this candy-filled holiday.

For a healthy Halloween: choose lower calorie alternatives watch portion sizes and adjust the focus from foods to activities such as carving pumpkins. Read on for more “tricks” to finding “treats” that won’t derail your family’s healthy efforts.

Here are some great tips:

If you plan to hand out treats, here are some health alternatives:

• Small Packages of Nuts, Raisins or Trail Mix
• Pretzels
• Mixed Nut Packets
• 100% Juice Box Package
• Applesauce Fruit Cups
• Other Non-food Treats such as: stickers, crayons, coloring books, whistles, rubber spiders and worms, yo-yos, bubbles, jump ropes, glow sticks and blown-up Halloween-themed balloons

Fun ideas for healthy recipes that your kids will love to make and eat:

Goopy Eye Balls - Toss grapes with a little bit of yogurt to make them slimy. Skin the grapes to make them even creepier.

Pumpkin Faces - Spread low-fat whipped cream cheese over rice cakes and make faces with raisin eyes and apple slice smiles.

Ants on a Log - Fill the center of celery sticks with peanut butter. Place a few raisins on top to be your ants.

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