Comments on: Trick or Treat: Creating a Frugal Halloween

By: cannon_fodder

cannon_fodder — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 02:31:18 +0000

Don’t forget to get dressed up yourself when answering the door! I did that the first few years when we moved to our house and the kids loved it (or were scared to death).

If you want a frugal Halloween do what we did – move to a house that only has houses lining one side of the street and most of the people are elderly who don’t give out candy. I miss living in a neighbourhood where there are lots of kids coming around.

But, I, too have seen a decline in the number of kids coming out as well as the effort made to get dressed up. However, every year always brings an especially cute kid that is so adorable – funny how they tend to get the biggest share of candies.

Also, if you want to be liked – give out mini chocolate bars. They were my favourites.

One Halloween memory for me was one of the last years I went out – it was raining all night but my costume was perfect. I went out as a bag of money. Simply put a garbage bag over my head and a big $ on the front. Well, we went to this lady’s house who must have been retired. She had a tray table of hot apple cider with cinnamon sticks in it. I was too young to really enjoy it, but I appreciated the thoughtfulness of her effort.

Unfortunately, today most parents would neither appreciate nor understand such a gesture.

By: Cheapskate Sandy

Cheapskate Sandy — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 00:27:21 +0000

I love this day! :) I round up some young cousins to take them trick-or-treating but it’s really because I want an excuse to dress up. I love it!

Anyway so my cheap tip is to use face paint instead of all the costumes. You can try Youtube for some creative makeup ideas.

By: Ms Save Money

Ms Save Money — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:22:43 +0000

@ In the Money – we had something like that in our neighborhood too – love the houses that dec out all the way – feels more festive.

By: Ms Save Money

Ms Save Money — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:21:16 +0000

I love Halloween – and find that doing paper mache to create halloween decor is the best, most fun, and cheapest way to celebrate.

By: Kathryn

Kathryn — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 18:11:45 +0000

Becky: They had play-doh for really cheap in small containers specifically designed for Halloween at Costco. It the same price as the chocolate bars but it lasted longer! :-)

Love the other creative Halloween ideas!

By: Becky

Becky — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:07:24 +0000

Why is giving Play Doh frugal? I’d think that would cost a lot more than a bunch of snack sized candy bars.

By: Paul the Accountant

Paul the Accountant — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 08:48:49 +0000

I don’t know if it’s just me but here in the UK Halloween seems to be on the decline, a lot of kids don’t even bother getting dressed up anymore. They just see it as an opportunity to knock on doors and ask for sweets or loose change, sometimes starting a week before halloween!

By: Canada Deals

Canada Deals — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:12:29 +0000

We already do most of the things you’ve laid out here. Great list though! I envy you for the 120 or so kids you get to your door. I wish we could get more than 20 kids to come to ours.

One of the funniest memories I have of my kids revolves around Halloween. My son was about 4 and we had just started scooping out his first pumpkin. He started playing around with the “guts” and I kept telling him not to when all of the sudden he gave out a little “urp” and promptly threw up inside it lol. Seeing that, mixed with all the slimy pumpkin guts lol, I threw up too.

He’s 15 now and we laugh about it every Halloween. Good times :)

Melanie

By: Janie Out of Debt

Janie Out of Debt — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 10:20:11 +0000

I love Halloween. I think this is a great post.

Best wishes,

Janie

By: In the Money

In the Money — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 22:44:05 +0000

I remember when I was a kid, there was this one house that was extremely creative in giving out treats. They had created a wheel that you could spin to see what you would get for a treat. Some were awesome large pieces of candy and the worst was a dog treat. It made for a wonderfully fun time.

By: Briefcases

Briefcases — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 21:56:20 +0000

I have fond memories of halloween as a child. We usually didn’t have a lot of money, but we still had a good time. My mom often created costumes for us for quite cheap. We always made the pumpkin carving an event too. I loved the baked pumpkin seeds afterwards.

By: Dharma

Dharma — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:03:15 +0000

A tip from a Mom of 2…..if your kids like character costumes, go out the week after Halloween with your little ankle biters and have them pick out *next* year’s costume. We generally save about 60-80% on costume blowouts :) Plus you can line the insides of that tickle trunk for “frugal” fun all year. The idea of having the basic wigs, makeup kits, house decorations etc is great and these are all on sale after the big night. (Note this for Christmas as well if you celebrate).

To make the absorbtion of buying all those candies a bit less expensive we have a party at our house on the Big Night. We get over 500 kids on average so the cost can be staggering!! Our neighbourhood is CRAZY that night and is a hoot! Everyone wants to be where we are because of this. Our evening is potluck for all families/comers with us supplying a BBQ treat for the kids prior to going out trick or treating (so no empty bellies out there roaming the neighbourhood). All the families also bring one big bag of candy each to donate to the cause. Cuts our costs huge….and we get to see all our friends and their kiddies costumes!!!!

I love Halloween, can you tell? It’s an event for us, on top of the big Pumpkin Carve night we do as well.

By: Alexandra

Alexandra — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:01:00 +0000

I just HATE having junk food sitting in my house because if it is in my house, I will eat it. So I buy the most disgusting treats I can find – last year it was bags of fake blood (actually liquid sugar with food colouring in it), eyeball gum, and gummy “hamburgers” and “hotdogs”. The more disgusting it looks, the better – this way the treats end up out the door with the kids instead of in my mouth (and then on my hips).

By: Craig

Craig — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 15:47:46 +0000

Buy early and in bulk. Will helps cut costs big time. Don’t go for the trendy halloween candy or packaging either.

By: Kathryn

Kathryn — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:11:58 +0000

Caitlin & FP: Great ideas with hand-me-downs and making your own.

Novice: True enough! He did give out ‘character’ ones so in this case the little kids still thought they were pretty cool. The big kids .. not so much.

By: Novice

Novice — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:01:31 +0000

Kathryn — have to say that as a kid, the people giving out toothbrushes go up pretty high on the ‘let’s egg them later’ list…..

By: Caitlin

Caitlin — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:59:03 +0000

We had a big costume trunk too! While my parents never bought us “a costume”, they did like to buy supplies to stock up the truck so we could make practically anything from the items inside. Shiny metallic pipe-cleaners become jewellery, a basic black wig can fit any costume, a few items from the local thrift store and fabric from the discount bin at the fabric store can be reused year after year for a variety of outfits. We always had a blast making our own costumes (and by “making our own”, I mean basically we played in the box and told my mom what we wanted to be, and she made it happen).

Granted, I grew up in the 80s, when the only store-bought costumes available were plastic masks and plastic smocks with a picture of the character you were supposed to be on the front of the smock. Classy!

Store costumes have much better variety these days, but they are still generally poorly made and are really intended to only be worn for a couple hours. Costumes you make yourself are always more fun! ^_^

By: Four Pillars

Four Pillars — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 11:04:37 +0000

I have to agree – I like Halloween as well.

So far we have just used hand-me-downs for costumes which has worked quite well.