Some Great Eco Friendly Halloween Ideas

My children are older now but Halloween has always been a fun time for us and I’d like to share some of the things we have done in the past with an Eco Friendly theme as well as giving you some new ideas.

Eco Friendly Pumpkins

Pumpkins are one of the first thing you think of at Halloween. We have always made good use of our pumpkins and Kim has written a great post on What to Do Pumpkins.

Here is my list of ways of being Eco Friendly with your Pumpkins

• Use as much as possible…
  seeds can be air dried and roasted for a tasty snack.
  you can store them in a cool dry place to plant between May and June to grow your own pumpkins
• The flesh can be used for sweet and savoury dishes.
• Leave your pumpkin outside with the lid off after Halloween for birds and insects to feed off, when it starts to go mouldy you can put it in the compost.

We have visited a Pumpkin Parlour at our local farm in the past. This gives the kids a spooky day out and they take away all of the pumpkin left overs for their animals. Leaving you with your carved pumpkin.

Eco Friendly Halloween Decorations

• If you do buy decorations keep them to reuse the following year. Just like you would keep your Christmas decorations.
• Try to buy as little plastic as possible.
• If you do need to get rid of them then pass them on to other’s through sharing sites such as Olio, or sell them on Ebay.
• If this isn’t possible then put them in the recycling.

Here are some decorations I found on Etsy.

Trick or Treat

• look for recyclable packaging or make your own paper bags
• Give your kids recyclable bags for their own collection of treats, or reuse the containers every year.
• Canvas bags carry more than plastic buckets!

You can try making your own treats, I’ve made chocolate truffles and fudge in the past. It does mean more work for you though, and unless you are making them for family and friends the children coming to the door will generally go for the packaged sweets over home made stuff.

When my Kids go out Trick or Treating, I take out any of the sweets that I know they won’t eat (my kids are fussy sweet eaters) and give them back to those that call to eliminate any waste (and help reduce my waist because I’m not so fussy!)

Costumes

We all know that Halloween is about dressing up. Last year the Little Man decided last minute that he wanted to go Trick or Treating and we had nothing in that fitted him. I threw him together a black cape and and put some face paint on. It was a bit rubbish, but it was really last minute and it meant he could join in. In the past we have bought costumes and made them ourselves. We have also visited the fancy dress shop to hire costumes when we have been going to parties. I’ve always made sure that everything is recycled, although I may have a few costumes in an old suitcase just for memory sake.

Here are some costume tips

• Take a look on Ebay or second hand shops rather than buying new.
• Swap with other parents of similar age kids so they feel like they have something new
• rent a costume from a fancy dress shop
• make your own costumes.