So I basically never blog about being a parent, not because I don’t love it (I pretty much love it more than anything), but because I am busy covering other things. But I saw this tip regarding Halloween on Facebook and I wanted to share it.

The question [via my friend Meaghan Carlson]:

Any tips on how to keep my sweet tooth kiddo from completely losing her mind over Halloween candy while letting her enjoy the parties with friends?

Great question. Our 4-year-old LOVES candy, and this will be our first Halloween where she sort of gets the whole thing and we can’t just pretend like she wasn’t just on the receiving end of a million pieces of candy come November 1.

This brilliant suggestion came along [by way of Katherine Kollman]:

Always a tough one. We always let them COLLECT (not eat) as much candy as they wanted, chose just a few pieces to keep (and eat one every day or something like that until it was gone) and then leave most of it out for the “Sugar Fairy” on Halloween night. The Sugar Fairy would take the candy and leave a small toy. They never seemed to mind giving it up. But I always tried to emphasize that it was the fun of the dressing up and being with friends than the accumulation of candy.

This might be a method many already know about, but I am fresh to all of this and it is certainly new to me. Thanks for the great suggestion, Katherine! It will be adopted in the Steed household as our wee one LOVES toys maybe even a little more than she does candy. I’ll report back on how it works out.