8 Things to Do With Halloween Candy

It's Halloween hangover time and you find yourself staring at those piles of sweets wondering what to do with all that extra Halloween candy? Here are 8 great suggestions.

1. ART

• Painting with Candy
• More Painting Ideas with Candy
• Candy Chromatography
• Make a Candy Monster

2. COOKING

For hard candies, like Jolly Ranchers, I make stained glass cookies. Look them up on Pintrest and you will see a lot of creative uses for holiday baking.

Save some candy for decorating your gingerbread house. Halloween candies are typically small and perfect to decorate with.

M&M's are yummy in trail mix or baked into cookies. Add to your favorite granola, nuts, pretzels, raisins and mix.

3. DONATE

• Blue Star Moms of Marin, Novato, bag candy into quart sized ziplock bags. To make it even more special, have your kids write on index card something like "Dear Soldier, thank you and we are thinking of you!"
• Operation Shoebox
• Ritter House, San Rafael
• Ronald McDonald House, San Francisco

4. EXCHANGE

Exchange candy for a book or toy.

5. HALLOWEEN CANDY BUYBACK:

Here are 4 local businesses who have partnered with other nonprofits:

SweetE Organic, November 1st-5th, exchange for delicious organic, non GMO, allergy-conscious candy without artificial dyes.  SweetE will start you off with a few pieces of candy and you can augment those treats with a purchase of your family’s favorites! Halloween candy along with a selection of SweetE candy will be donated to the Ritter Center.

Yolo Yogurt Lounge, 15% discount on froyo in exchange for donating your Halloween candy from November 1st-7th, donating to Ritter Center.

Nichols Orthodontics, Inc. November 3rd-4th, will give you $1 for every pound for your unopened Halloween candy brought into their Greenbrae office for Operation Gratitude, sending care packages to U.S. Military Troops.

Gila Dorostkar, DDS Pediatric Dentistry, November 3rd-7th, collecting Halloween candy and letters to send to our military troops for Operation Gratitude. 

6. MATH

Candies come in many colors and shapes can make a great math tool. Practice addition, subtraction, counting by fives and tens and multiplication and division. Chocolate bars are great for visualizing fractions.  Sort candy and figure out percentages and - here's a challenge - count calories. Try seeing how many calories are in your child's Halloween loot and post it here.

7. RECYCLE

Fill up goodie bags and piñatas at the next party. 

8. SCIENCE

• Candy Experiments
• Candy Corn Catapults
• Exploding Peeps
• Sink or Float Candy Experiments