Halloween At Home – How To Have The Best Time During The Strangest Of Times!
Top tips, tricks and ideas to help you have a fun Halloween despite the current pandemic putting a dampener on things.
Halloween is a holiday that usually involves a lot of parties, events and social activities – but sadly that won’t be happening this year. There will be some socially distanced events going on, but realistically, it will be a Halloween like no other.
With that in mind, Abbey Road Dental in St John’s Wood wants to help brighten up your Halloween with some creative, useful tips and tricks to help you celebrate this spooky holiday in a different way.
Here are our top tips for having the best time at Halloween, during a strange time for all of us:
Make Your Own Decorations
The shops are full of decorations that you can buy, but when you’re already lacking in a sense of occasion, it makes sense to perhaps make your own decorations. This gives the kids more to look forward to, and makes everything you do decorate with, that little bit more special. Here’s an article packed with ideas for DIY Halloween decorations you can enjoy making with the kids.
A Movie Marathon
Movie marathons are a really fun (and laid back) way to celebrate Halloween. You can keep it kid-friendly with classics like Hocus Pocus and the Simpsons Halloween episodes. Alternatively, make it more adult with the latest IT films, or all the Halloween films. Just be sure to turn the lights out and keep it super spooky!
Healthy Halloween Food
Halloween food is often everybody’s favourite aspect of the holiday. Toffee apples, chocolates and sweets, buffet food – they are all aspects of Halloween we remember from being kids. As your teeth don’t do too well from this kind of food anyway, why not have fun making your own healthy Halloween food instead?
How about carrot sticks to dip in hummus trailing out of a pumpkins mouth? Or ants on a log (peanut butter and raisins on celery). Creepy Halloween treats don’t need to be high in calories or sugar, which is great news for your oral health and your overall health at any time of the year.
If you are going to indulge a little, take care to:
- Consume sugar and acidic foods during mealtimes to limit the time your teeth are exposed to acid attacks
- Drink water after meals
- Chew sugar free chewing gum after meals
- Try to avoid chewy toffees and sticky sweets that will stick to the teeth and cause damage for longer periods of time
- Avoid sweets too hard for you to eat if you have dentures or braces
A Halloween Outing
Who’s to say that you can’t go out as a family and have a Halloween outing? Get dressed up and go somewhere that is still holding socially distanced events, like a pumpkin farm. This helps the kids feel a sense of occasion, whilst everyone remains safe.
Halloween Playlist
There’s never a better time to put on all the spooky songs you know and have a dance! Get dressed up and play those spooky songs, perhaps even learning the dance moves to Backstreets Back or Thriller whilst you’re at it!
Spread Some Halloween Joy
It’s a good time to put back into society something that may be lacking a bit for some – joy. Some people feel really lonely and isolated, some feel particularly anxious, others a bit deflated by everything that is happening in the world at the moment. To spread some Halloween joy you could forfeit the money you usually spend on a party and donate it to a charity that needs the help. You could leave some anonymous packages of happiness for your neighbours (prepackaged snacks and treats perhaps?). You could have the kids make Halloween cards and deliver them to the houses in your street.
If we all spread a little more joy, perhaps we can keep the world feeling a little brighter during such challenging times?
Creepy Science
Kids love a bit of creepy science, and plenty of adults enjoy it too. Making some slime, for example, is an easy winner with the kids. For more inspiration, checkout this video with some great DIY Halloween ideas.
A Treasure Hunt
At Easter an egg hunt goes down really well with the kids, and it keeps everybody active and enjoying nature too. Why not do something similar for Halloween? You could buy a mixture of edible and non-edible treats and hide them around the garden, perhaps with spooky clues to go with them?
If you do let the kids collect Halloween sweet treats, Abbey Road Dental recommends letting the kids choose a sweet treat at mealtimes for dessert so they aren’t consuming lots and lots of sugar over a long period of time.
Ghoulish Games
There are lots of games that are Halloween themed, and tons of fun. Throwing bean bags or balls into the pumpkin, bobbing for apples and pinning the tail on the zombie donkey are all fun ideas to try.
Halloween Video Call Parties
If you really want to enjoy the social side of Halloween, why not arrange a Halloween video call with your nearest and dearest? You could do a Halloween quiz, or just get dressed up and share a drink together over the screen. Sometimes just being in contact with others brightens things up and adds a bit of fun to an event.
Halloween In Nature
There are lots of things in nature to enjoy with the family that work well for a Halloween event such as:
- Spotting bats
- Rockpooling for crabs (if you live near the sea of course!)
- Searching for creepy crawlies in the undergrowth
- Looking at spiders through magnifying glasses
- Making Halloween art from fallen leaves and twigs
Nature is a really great place to be to boost your mental health and happiness. If you can make your trip into nature Halloween themed, you’re definitely onto a good thing!
Pumpkin Carving
You can’t have Halloween without pumpkin carving! Whether you carve tiny pumpkins to make mini displays, or huge pumpkins into spooky characters – it’s a fun activity that costs very little. Don’t forget to leave your pumpkins in the forest for the squirrels after Halloween is done!
Here at Abbey Road Dental we want to help our patients enjoy events and occasions as much as possible during such a challenging time. We’re here for tips and tricks like the above to help the whole family enjoy Halloween during the pandemic.
In the meantime, we’re also still up and running for all your dental health needs, so please do get in touch if you have any oral health concerns or you need to make an appointment. You can reach your NW8 clinic on 02076241603, enquiries@abbeyroaddental.co.uk or on our online contact form.
Happy Halloween from us all at Abbey Road Dental!