Do you let your kids eat all of the Halloween candy at one time? Or give it out little by little?

[Anonymous]

I don't think I would let a 2 year old just eat as much as they wanted, but around 4 I started letting my kid decide. By then I could see that she's the kind to eat some candy and stop without intervention. If she was a gorge and then puke kind of kid I would limit.

[Anonymous]

They get a handful on Halloween and then a couple of pieces a day for the next week or so. Then I take the rest of chocolate out and hide it to use in baking for Christmas and Easter. After the chocolate is gone, they usually lose interest quickly and I end up tossing the rest.

[Anonymous]

We don't celebrate Halloween, but our kids wind up with large candy collections on certain Jewish holidays. Purim is the biggest haul, then Simchat Torah, Sukkot, and Chanukah. We let them eat a few pieces the day they get it, and then they get to keep the rest and eat 1-2 a day.

[Anonymous]

Our DD is given 6 pieces — 2 pieces over the following 3 days. Everything else is thrown out.

[Anonymous]

Of course not! Letting a kid eat 40 pieces of candy until their stomach hurts is bad parenting.

On Halloween they can pick out a few pieces to eat - 3 or 4. Then they like to play around with it, organize it in 50 different ways, etc. In normal years they bring a baggie of all the candy they don't like to school to trade with their friends, and two pieces to eat.

Two pieces a day going forward.

[Anonymous]

I don't let me kids go trick or treating. Problem solved.

[Anonymous]

DS can eat what he wants on Halloween, then it becomes dessert. 2 mini bars a night. A good amount ends up at work. Not a big deal.

[Anonymous]

Normal times -

We sort out the candy. Discard or donate the cheap stuff. Keep the more expensive ones. Give the kids their entire loot. They can eat it in one fell swoop or eat a little at a time.


COVID times -

Give bags of expensive sanitized candy that we got for our kids, and hand it out to them. They can eat everything in one fell swoop or eat little at a time.

The TOT candy will get passed on to my cleaning lady.

[Anonymous]

We let them binge on Halloween night. After that, a few pieces after lunch each day. We tried to let DS self-regulate on sweets this summer, but he can’t. (I can’t either, so it’s not surprising.) Instead, I tell him that after his younger brother is in bed for nap time, he can ask for his candy. After he hasn’t asked in two weeks, I usually eat the rest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Of course not! Letting a kid eat 40 pieces of candy until their stomach hurts is bad parenting.

On Halloween they can pick out a few pieces to eat - 3 or 4. Then they like to play around with it, organize it in 50 different ways, etc. In normal years they bring a baggie of all the candy they don't like to school to trade with their friends, and two pieces to eat.

Two pieces a day going forward.

There have been times when I have eaten A LOT of candy in one sitting, as has my child, neither of us has ever had any stomach issues related to candy consumption.

[Anonymous]

My kids are 5 and 3. They love trick or treating and get a big haul. Even this year, they each got about 50 pieces of candy. No way would I let them eat 50 pieces at once! They each got to pick 3 pieces last night and 2 tonight. Well probably limit to 1-2 per day after dinner until they forget about it (last year they forgot after about a week and we have the rest away.) If we did allow them to eat as much as they wanted, my 5 year old would probably naturally limit himself and stop before he felt sick bc he’s generally pretty aware of his body like that and pretty self disciplined. My 3 year old if allowed to would guaranteed eat herself sick.

[Anonymous]

Just 5 or 6 pieces?!

That sounds so boring. My kids ate a bunch last night, and snacked on it throughout the day as we watched movies.

[Anonymous]

My kids are same age, 4 and 2. We do the same thing, eat as much as you want when you want. Only rule is no candy 45 mins before a meal. Halloween night they each had around 6 pieces then got tired of it. Next day they had a few pieces after breakfast, then didn't mention again till after dinner and then had a few more. By tomorrow it will be gone. It's much less interesting to them when it's not forbidden or limited and they get tired of it pretty quick, and they learn their own limits. Plus it's more fun! I mean it's a few days of candy bingeing out of an entire year.

[Anonymous]

I have a 4 year old. Got a smallish stash due to covid since we didn't venture too far. She took out all the hard candy and gave it to me. She tried a bunch of the chocolates but stopped when her tummy was full. At night i stole all the peanut butter based candy, haha. I let her have another round this morning. With most of the chocolate gone I think she is done and probably won't ask about her bag again.

[Anonymous]

I gave a full basket of chocolate/candies to almost 5 year old & 20 months old yesterday. 20 months old did not know what Halloween is, so she was not interested in eating any of them, but she poured them out & put them back as toy.
Almost 5 year old was excited, and he was satisfied & overjoyed when I allowed him to pick one piece to eat. And, he thanked me when I gave him another piece yesterday later.

Today, as always, he completely forgot about them, but the youngest one remembered the basket & asked to play with pouring them out & putting back them in game. I have to remind the oldest one if he wants another chocolate, and he says if I want to. He has sweet tooth, but I don’t understand why he does not care about “eating“ Halloween chocolate/candies at all but he cares about “receiving” as many as he could on Halloween. Well, for the next few days, I will remind him, and then I will put them away & ultimately eaten by me.