It’s easy to forget all those good plastic-free habits at Halloween and go wild… However turns out, avoiding plastic this Halloween is easy as!
Get the kids (or your) creative juices flowing with these plastic-free Halloween ideas:
Make your own costumes
Avoid the plastic packaging that comes along when you buy a ready-made costume from a store, or online by making your own! Look for ways to incorporate recycled materials such as old food packaging, cardboard, or old clothes! Scavenge through your wardrobe and see what can find; accessorise with belts, hats and other goodies you might have forgotten about!
Make your own decorations
Use recycled materials you already have - an easy way to keep the kids busy in the lead up to Halloween. A few easy ideas include:
- Spooky milk bottle ghosts - all you need are your old used milk bottles (or any used bottles for that matter) and a pen! Draw some scary faces. You could try stringing them up/placing them around the exterior of your house for trick-or-treaters!
- Paint toilet paper rolls and give them fun/scary faces - string these up around your house!
- An obvious one: using old sheets to make into ghosts! Go wild drawing a face (or cutting ambiguous eyes out) and you have yourself a ghost!
- Make awesome glowing spooky faces by reusing old jars. Glue recycled/used paper to the exterior of the jar and draw a scary face. If you want to be a bit extra, pop a smaller candle inside the jar and put somewhere it will get seen at night!
Or if you want to go all out, make a huge scary house spider out of recycled materials, like this one on Scanlan St (Auckland)!
Made by Zac Johnson.
Hosting a Halloween party?
Skip disposable cups, plates and cutlery, and use your own dishes. If you don’t have enough, invite your guests to bring their own! I am sure they will be impressed with the plastic-free gesture.
Trick or Treat
Ditch the plastic-wrapped lollies and give out home-baked treats instead! Giving out baked biscuits, cupcakes or even fruit is much better eco-alternative and healthier too - other parents will appreciate!
You can even make your own spooky biscuits: SEE RECIPE HERE.
Got leftover Halloween costumes/decorations?
Don’t let these go to waste! Either keep these in a safe place for next year, or donate to your local school, childcare facility, school drama department or Op shop!