Tips to Make Your Halloween a Little More Green

Halloween is a lot of fun for everyone. Costumes, candy and decoration can be fun, but they can also result in a lot of waste. However, there are a lot of fun ways to cut down on that holiday waste and still have a blast.

1) Get Natural Decorations: Decorating with pumpkins, gourds, hay and other fall farm fare isn't just local farmer friendly- a lot of it is also compostable! If you scrape out your Jack-O-Lantern like most people, you can even make a tasty snack out of your seeds.

2) Homemade Costumes: If you've had children you know they come up with some crazy stuff for halloween costumes. However, most stores don't carry Tornado costumes. This is just one reason that homemade costumes are an attractive option. Often times you can make a much nicer (and often times reusable) costume at home, and it doesn't involve masks that aren't recyclable.

3) Use Reusable Bags: Reusable bags are durable, and frankly more suited to candy collecting, especially in large neighborhoods. It also means less plastic bags flying around in the weeks following Halloween. If you need a new reusable bag for Halloween, make sure to check out our list of great tutorials here.

4) Green your Halloween Party: When you're in that stage between being the age of a trick-or-treater and having children Halloween Parties are one of the best ways to celebrate. It's important to offer snacks and drinks in large bowls with the option of smaller dinnerware that isn't disposable, whether it's compostable or your own dishes you won't be sending it to a landfill on garbage day.

5) Consider a Candy Alternative: Although it's hard to imagine Halloween without Candy, there are plenty of fun things to give out that require less wrappers and may even be healthier (or not food at all). Plenty of stores stock Halloween themed pencils and crayons, which are great, useful gifts. Pre-packaged dried fruit and pretzels often have less packaging and are, admittedly, more filling than a fun-sized candy bar. They keep a few more wrappers from entering the waste stream and they're a little healthier for the kids.

Those are just a few great ways to green your Halloween this year! What are you doing to make your Halloween a little more green? Have any great stories about the tips we did give? Share in the comments!