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Night of the Teal Pumpkin

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The-Teal-Pumpkin-Project-2Halloween is this Friday! Excited?

As people get more health conscious, and as the incidence of food allergies in kids continues to skyrocket (when will we figure out why?), there’s been a growing interest in handing out something besides candy. If that’s what you’ve got boiling in the cauldron this year, you may want to put out a teal pumpkin to let people know.

The Teal Pumpkin Project was an introduced by FARE (Food Allergy Research and Education) as a way to help parents of kids with food allergies to identify “safe” houses to trick-or-treat at.

Here’s a list of suggestions for things you could provide:

  • Glow sticks, bracelets, or necklaces
  • Pencils, pens, crayons or markers
  • Bubbles
  • Halloween erasers or pencil toppers
  • Mini Slinkies
  • Whistles, kazoos, or noisemakers
  • Bouncy balls
  • Finger puppets or novelty toys
  • Coins
  • Spider rings
  • Vampire fangs
  • Mini notepads
  • Playing cards
  • Bookmarks
  • Stickers
  • Stencils

We’ve been handing out superballs the past few years and the kids have been excited by a toy they can play with all year. I’ll bet Archie McPhee’s would have some bits of oddness you could give away, as well.

Weather is supposed to be on-and-off rain, but nothing serious. We’ll be out reverse-trick-or-treating, as always.

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Jordan

I started Wallyhood back in 2008, right when my son was born, because I realized I had lived in the neighborhood since 1993 and didn't really know my neighbors. I figured writing a blog about what was going on around me would be a good way to meet people and help other people do the same. As the years progressed, those neighbors have picked up the torch and it is now a group effort, which I adore. I moved out of Wallingford for a few years (2020 - 2025), but I'm back, now living with my wife, son and dog (Dillinger) up in Tangletown.

This Post Has 3 Comments

  1. Heidi October 27, 2014

    This is such a wonderful idea! For years, we gave out both candies and non-edible fun things and was always amazed by how kids seemed much more excited about the non-candy stuff. This year, we will have our teal pumpkin and poster, and will be giving out treasures instead of treats. Let’s hope for more non-food/non-candy trick-o-treating!

  2. jacqui October 27, 2014

    Comics Dungeon has packets of mini-comics for sale, too. They are designed to be treat-bag friendly.

  3. Sunnyside family October 27, 2014

    We’ve been giving out toys for years, since we lived on Woodlawn Ave N (now on Sunnyside Ave N). Not related to food allergy, but just as a novelty since most others are giving out candy and we thought, why not? We don’t have fewer visitors that we can tell compared to others on our block. I’m not sure what’s more toxic overall, since many of the toys are heavy on the plastics. But they shouldn’t increase diabetes risk…

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