Green Halloween

Halloween is almost here, and we’re excited to bring you an interview from Corey Colwell-Lipson, the founder of Green Halloween. Green Halloween is a wonderful initiative so we’re thrilled to share it with you!  For more information, visit Corey’s website at http://www.greenhalloween.org/.

Tell us about Green Halloween: Green Halloween is a community movement to create child and Earth-Friendly holiday traditions, beginning with Halloween. Green Halloween is also proof that when a community comes together for a common purpose, great things can happen. Further, Green Halloween shows that when individuals, families, organizations and businesses all pull together to make the world a better place, everyone benefits and can have fun in the process. Green Halloween also seeks to bring back an older tradition of Halloween: raising awareness of and money for worthy causes. This year, in Seattle, our community is raising money for Treeswing, a local non-profit that seeks to improve children’s health through improved nutritional and exercise habits. Some people ask whether GH is an environmental movement or a health movement. It’s really hard to separate the two because what is good for us is usually good for the planet and visa versa. Green Halloween is about approaching the holidays with a mindset that our choices as parents, consumers and citizens of a community affect our children, our planet and the people who make the products we buy and use. This concept is not specific to the holidays, or to Halloween, but the holidays are often a time when we tend to focus more on tradition than on health and environmentalism. Green Halloween hopes to create new and sustainable traditions that keep the great memories, but lose the kid- Earth- and people-unfriendly choices. Green Halloween also seeks to help making these choices less complicated, more affordable and of course, fun. Green Halloween incorporates choices from at least one of three considerations: child-friendliness (including health), Earth-friendliness, and people-friendliness (the people who grow or make the products we buy or use.) Ideally, Halloween choices and purchases would take all three areas into account but that is often hard to do. We suggest that families do what they can and what will make their Halloween and their consciences happy. In addition, a fourth consideration gives preference for choices, products and or traditions that help others in some way. Our website will have loads of ideas for how to shift from having a traditional Halloween to celebrating a healthy and green one. For example, tradition dictates that we give away only sugary treats to trick-or-treaters. Green Halloween suggests that you think outside the candy-box. We provide options for treats and treasures that are not only healthy, but gentler on the earth as well. For instance, recycled plastic whistles, gemstones or locally grown honey sticks are all fantastic candy alternatives. Or, you may want to host a party instead of having your kids go door-to-door. At your party, instead of using decorations purchased at the party-supply store, you may want to consider using items from nature, supplemented by decorations made from reused or recycled materials. Having a Green Halloween is as much about what you buy as what you don’t, so whereas a traditional Halloween may involve a lot of shopping for costumes, treats, party favors, decorations, etc., having a Green Halloween means making putting a holiday spin on reducing, reusing and recycling. From health and environmental standpoints, there are many holiday practices I’d like to see changed. All traditional holidays, including Halloween, make ample use of products made from these unhealthy or environmentally unfriendly materials, and yet numerous alternatives exist. Our planet has a limited ability to regenerate itself and Green Halloween seeks to reduce our eco-footprint by using our collective creativity, flexibility and common interest in the planet to create new holiday traditions while maintaining the heart and soul of our holidays. Green Halloween is about focusing on what is important – the fun and the good memories – and about letting go of unsustainable practices that in the short and long terms, harm our children and our world. (see our LINKS page for more info/ stats on everything from toxic costumes to the obesity epidemic).

Please note: Several parents have seen our list of suggested items and have been concerned about the fact that some of the items, such as beads and rocks, are chokeable. We suggest that parents look at non-candy items the same way that they do candy items: kids under the age of three can choke on just about anything. My older daughter put objects in her mouth until she was four – so never could have been given many of the suggested items until she was older. My nephew, however, played with small objects and toys with small objects, from a very early age, although I would still never trust that just because he never did put things in his mouth that he wouldn’t… It’s always that one time… So, just as many traditional treats are a choking risk, many non-candy treats should never be given to children under three, or should be “traded” soon after they are given. Also, honey sticks should not be given to children under the age of one.  

How can our readers educate and involve their children?  I believe that it is important to educate and involve children in developmentally appropriate ways. With all ages, our best educational tool is our own behavior. If we model healthy behaviors and respect for our planet, our children will absorb our ways. We can also teach them with our words and through our traditions. When we include and involve children in life lessons, the learning sinks even deeper. Children can take part in growing healthy food or shopping for and preparing a healthy holiday meal. They can help plan games and create their own costumes. They can think of ways to incorporate helping others into their festivities and can find creative ways to reduce, reuse and recycle. Teenagers can be taught about the not-so-happy side of Halloween such as the use of child-slavery in cocoa farming and the use of toxic chemicals in everything from candy to costumes. They may wish to find ways to make positive changes. With teenagers, especially, I believe that it is important to let them know: you CAN make a difference in the world. All children will enjoy new traditions when they see that their parents are positive about the changes.

In addition… From my website: Every child is different. Some are already budding environmentalists and are simply looking for guidance from adults about how to apply their passion for the planet into their lives. For these kids, the transition from a traditional Halloween into a green one will likely be easy. Other children may be upset, disappointed or angry at the idea of giving up what they have known and what they expect. This is completely understandable and is one reason Green Halloween is placing a great deal of emphasis on children in the 1- 5 age ranges. Young children have less concretized expectations of holiday traditions and will generally be open to creating new ones. Regarding older children, we believe it is important for parents to talk openly with their kids about why they’ve chosen to reduce or eliminate traditional treats. Let your kids know that you care about their health, the health of other people’s children and the health of our planet. Ask them how they feel about the changes and ask them for their ideas on how Halloween can be made greener. You may be surprised by what they come up with. Be open to incorporating their ideas and encourage them to be involved with the planning of your Green Halloween.Older children can be given choices. Perhaps they can do less trick-or-treating and have a party instead. For the party, they can help you choose healthy food and prizes. You may decide that it’s okay for your child to have some candy. If so, kids can keep a pre-determined amount and then trade the rest for some other things that they enjoy like a book or appropriate CD or some coupons for skating, horse back riding or any other activity they might enjoy.This is not an all or nothing situation. As a parent, you can be both a guide and a partner with your child regardless of his age. And remember that your child takes cues from you. If you are excited about new traditions, your child is more likely to be as well. If I’m only going to try one thing this year to make a change in our Halloween, where should I start? Start with whatever idea sounds fun to you and your children. Depending on your child’s age, attempting to stop all door to door candy questing can backfire. Instead, talk with your children about the possibilities (assuming they are old enough to have this discussion). Let them decide what they’d like to try first.With younger children, choose whatever will be simple and easy for you. The main idea is to commit to the concept of Green Halloween.

What’s next after Halloween? With 2007 marking the beginning of Green Halloween in Seattle (and on the web), my goal for the next two years is to create a model from which other cities and towns across the country can create Green Halloween traditions, utilizing the unique flavor and flair of their own community and their community’s resources. I expect that over the next two years, Halloween traditions across the Nation will become healthier and more Earth-friendly, with more individuals and families finding ways to enjoy the holiday while at the same time enjoying the knowledge that their choices are not hurting other people or our planet as much as they previously had. My broader goal is to integrate easy, affordable, fun, kid and Earth-friendliness into all holiday traditions such as birthdays and Christmas. I hope that being ‘green’ all year long will become a notion embraced by mainstream America. One other plan for GH is to make our logo a recognized symbol which will be used on holiday products such as for trick-or-treating, birthday and holiday gift bags items, stocking stuffers, etc. This year, you’ll start to see our logo on a few items and over the next few years, we hope that our logo will be meaningful to the masses: when parents see our logo, they’ll know that the item they are buying meets our standard of child/planet/people friendliness. In addition, whenever our logo is used, a portion of the sales of that product will go towards helping others and or our planet. I’m also currently working with a number of companies to meet the demand of parents who want affordable, healthy and Earth-friendly products to be available and accessible everywhere