Halloween is a favorite holiday of many kids and adults, but like Christmas, Halloween also creates a lot of waste. Costumes, decorations, and candy top the list of what makes Halloween so spooktacular for ghouls and boys, and equally as scary to people trying to live a sustainable lifestyle.
Reducing Waste of Costumes, Decorations, and Candy
Having a green Halloween shouldn’t spook you. One simple place to start is with reducing your family’s waste. By minimizing new purchases and reusing what you already have, you will have less garbage to dispose of or recycle later.
Costumes
When it comes to being green with costumes, your best bet it to do it yourself. Homemade costumes are often made from materials that you already have in your own home or closet. Another option for costumes would be to borrow or trade costumes with a friend, or purchase a used costume at a thrift store or vintage clothing store, instead of buying new.
Decorations
There are many fun ways that you can creatively reuse or recycle items for Halloween decorations. For instance, the ghost lanterns made from milk jugs has been wildly popular on Pinterest this year. Another great decoration for Halloween is a scarecrow. You don’t have to buy anything – use leaves in your lawn, recycle old jeans and a button down shirt, and fill an old pillowcase or Halloween mask for the head. Nature’s most perfect green Halloween decoration, of course, is the pumpkin! They can be grown in your own garden, carved, used for pumpkin seeds, and then composted.
Trick-or-Treating
Instead of buying a fancy bag for your little goblin’s trick -or-treating, opt for a reusable bag, an ice cream bucket, or whatever worked last year. Another clever and idea is for trick-or-treaters is to collect canned items for the local food shelf instead of candy (and it is meaningful too!). When giving candy out from your own haunted house, try to offer items with little packaging or better yet, give useful treats like pencils or erasers.
Don’t be a scaredy-cat! This Halloween, think about how your family can change just one or two habits to be more environmentally friendly and less wasteful. A sustainable lifestyle can be created with a few small steps at a time. For more great earth-friendly Halloween tips, goto GreenHalloween.org.
How is your family having a greener Halloween? What will you reuse or recycle this year?
