Serve creative, tasty and nutritious treats in your child’s lunchbox or at the neighborhood party by making these healthy Halloween treats and swaps.

It is possible to serve cute, creative, tasty and healthy Halloween treats in your child’s lunchbox or at a school or neighborhood Halloween party. I’ve shared my top practical, doable, Pinterest-approved treats and snacks that everyone is sure to love below.

Disclosure: The info shared in this blog was shared on a sponsored TV segment for ABC 33/40. Sponsors for the segment included Chobani, POM Wonderful, Wonderful Pistachios, and KIND Snacks.. All thoughts are my own.

Skip: High Sugar Yogurt Tubes
Choose: All Natural (Lower Sugar) Greek Yogurt Tubes & Pouches

Ellie and Frances are obsessed with yogurt in a tube and yogurt pouches (“squeezies” as we like to call them) but I really have to watch out because they often like to eat more than one (especially of the tubes) and the calories and sugar start to add up quick. While I’m pumped that they are eating yogurt, I got to a point where I had to treat the tubes as a special treat so that they would eat half plain and half flavored Greek yogurt in a bowl.

When I received samples from my friends at Chobani of their new Greek yogurt tubes and pouches for kids and tots that had 25% less sugar than leading kids’ yogurt tubes plus twice the protein, I was stoked. Finally, a product that I felt good about giving them that would fill them up, provide probiotics for digestive health, use only real ingredients, be a good source of calcium, and are free of artificial colors or flavors.

Plus, these make a fun Halloween lunchbox addition because the girls favorite characters are on the product like Doc McStuffins, Spiderman, and Winnie the Pooh.

Skip: Candy Bars and Cookies
Choose: Fruit and Nut Bars

While we’re on the topic of low sugar, let’s recognize that it is Halloween, there is candy, cookies and treats galore, and in no way am I trying to be a fun sponge to suck the joy out of someone’s holiday. However, many people treat the week leading up to Halloween and then pretty much the next two months until January 1 as time to throw caution to the wind and feast.

Candy bars, cookies, and other sweets really pack in the sugar and calories but for someone like me with a major sweet tooth, it is nice to have a wholesome and tasty option like KIND bars that are naturally sweetened from dried fruit and honey (so no artificial sweeteners there) and have only 5-6 grams of sugar per bar (versus 20 grams in a Snickers bar).

Wrap up your KIND bars with crate paper and glue on wiggly eyeballs to make mummies or cut them into squares and make robots with toothpicks. Good for you foods are definitely fun!

Skip: Fruit Drinks and Skittles
Choose: 100% pomegranate juice and pomegranate arils

School parties are notorious for serving up super sweet fruit-flavored drinks. Beverages like Koolaid just make me cringe because they make the girls bonkers when they drink them! I love the idea of swapping up fruit drinks and soda for 100% pomegranate juice like Pome Wonderful Pomegranate juice is sweet and tarts, has no added color or sugar, and each 8ounce bottle has the juice of 2 whole pomegranates. Plus, it is loaded with nutrition.

In keeping with the pomegranate theme, if you’re a fan of fruit candy like Skittles then consider swapping them for pompom arils. These are the little juicy kernels within the pomegranate (and yes, you can eat the seed). The offer a sweet juicy bite in every aril as well as fiber, antioxidants and vitamin C.

Make festive drinks for kids and adults alike by mixing POM Wonderful with sparkling water. Freeze ice cubes with spider rings inside of them or rim a small glass with red sugar and it “Blood Juice.” Add POM POMS to the drink or fill a bowl with POM POMS add a spooky plastic hand in the center of the bowl.

Skip: Salty chips
Choose: Pistachios

Cheesy, greasy, and salty chips are so easy to mindlessly eat while standing by the buffet of snacks at a Halloween party. But how filling and satisfying are they, really? That’s why I like serving pistachios like the various flavors from Wonderful Pistachios at parties. I’m a fan of the Lightly Salted but I’ve found that people who like flavored chips are big fans of their flavored varieties like Sweet Chili.

The cool thing about pistachios is that you can eat 3 times as more pistachios than chips per serving (so that’s 49 pistachios to about 12 chips). Plus, they’re crunchy, colorful (Ellie is obsessed with only eating the purple ones) and nutritious offering fiber, protein, and antioxidants.

Pass out mini bags of Wonderful Pistachios in place of candy or make a shaker with empty pistachio shells to shoo away the ghosts.

Skip: Passing out Candy
Choose: Passing out Fun Allergy-Friendly Favors

While the aisles were loaded with major bags of candy at my local grocery store and major chain discount store, I was able to find some affordable packs of non-food Halloween items that would certainly be trick-or-treat approved. The bag had rulers with bat stencils, activity pads, bubbles, and stickers and to that I usually add mini containers of play dough, glow sticks, and spider rings.

Because many children suffer from food allergies, the Food Allergy Reseach & Education (FARE) created a national campaign in 2014 called the Teal Pumpkin Project encouraging the public to take a pledge to ensure a safer and happier Halloween for all children. According to FARE, those who take the pledge put a teal pumpkin on their doorstep to indicate that they are FARE’s Teal Pumpkin Project™ promotes safety, inclusion and respect of individuals managing food allergies.

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Happy Halloween!

However you decide to celebrate with whatever foods or non-food treats you choose, remember to make safe, smart decisions on Halloween. For a good reminder of Halloween safety tips or for a specific checklist to review with your child, Safe Kids Worldwide has a very helpful collection.

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