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I'm That House With Full Size Bars. Here's My Halloween Candy Bowl Setup
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items Every October you see those sad little bowls with three fun-size Snickers melting in the sun. That's not your house. You want the neighborhood kids sprinting up your driveway, you want the parents mouthing ‘thank you’ from the sidewalk, and you want ...
Sections
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Full Size Candy Bars That Make Kids Lose Their Minds
Candy Bowls That Actually Look Good on a Porch
Porch Decorations That Set the Scene Around the Bowl
Signs and Extras So Nobody Steals the Whole Bowl
Backup Candy for When You Run Out at 8 PM
Full Size Candy Bars That Make Kids Lose Their Minds
The little bags of mixed minis are fine for office breakrooms. But nothing hits like a kid reaching into your bowl and pulling out a full-size Reese's. Their face alone is worth the extra cost.
Keep a stash of these front and center. Last year a dad literally circled back to ask where I got them. The peanut butter to chocolate ratio on full size is just different.
Reese's Peanut Butter Snack Size Cups (Pack of 36)
Grab these early because they vanish from shelves by the second week of October. If you're the house handing out full Snickers, you're basically running for neighborhood mayor and winning.
SNICKERS, Full Size Chocolate Candy Bars, 11.16 oz
Toss these in for the kids who are weirdly loyal to Kit Kats (there are more of them than you think). One trick-or-treater last year said ‘finally, a real one’ and I felt like a hero.
Kit Kat Milk Chocolate Wafer Full Size Candy Bar, 1.5 oz
Use these to cover the non-chocolate crowd. My neighbor's kid has a nut allergy and his mom almost cried when she saw I had a full-size Skittles option sitting right there.
Skittles Original Full Size Fruity Chewy Candy 2.17 oz
Candy Bowls That Actually Look Good on a Porch
I used to throw everything in a mixing bowl from my kitchen. It worked, but it looked like I forgot Halloween was happening. A solid bowl pulls the whole setup together.
Set this right on the top step and it practically glows under porch lights. Sturdy enough that it survived a windstorm last October and still looked creepy doing it.
Halloween Black Skull Candy Bowl, 4.7-in, Plastic
Bring this out if you want little kids to dare each other to grab candy from it. The motion-activated hand freaked out my own dog, which honestly sold me on it immediately.
Animated Motion Sensor Witch Candy Bowl
Swap out a boring flat bowl for this and suddenly your porch looks intentional. Deep enough to hold about 30 full-size bars without them toppling over every time someone reaches in.
Mini Cauldron Trick-or-Treat Bucket, Black, 4"
Snag this one for a classic look that works whether your house is decorated or totally bare. It's the Honda Civic of Halloween bowls. Reliable, fits everything, zero complaints.
Jack-o'-Lantern Trick-or-Treat Pail, Orange, 8"
Porch Decorations That Set the Scene Around the Bowl
A candy bowl sitting on a bare porch is like a DJ playing in an empty room. You need at least a little atmosphere to make the walk up your driveway feel worth it.
Stick two of these along the walkway and suddenly your house looks like it has a personality. They're solar powered so you don't have to remember to plug anything in before sunset.
Light-Up Metal Jack-o'-Lantern Decoration
Place these around the candy bowl for a warm glow that says ‘come grab candy, we’re friendly.' No batteries died on me through three straight weeks of nightly use last year.
Way To Celebrate Pumpkins
Try this if your neighborhood has little kids who scare easily. It's goofy, not terrifying, and it basically acts as a beacon that screams ‘free candy over here’ from half a block away.
4 Foot Ghost Screamer for Halloween by Airblown Inflatables
Drape this across the bushes near your door and you're done. Took me four minutes to set up and a trick-or-treater asked if real spiders made it, which felt like a five-star review.
Super Stretch Spider Web Decoration, Green, 165 sq ft
Signs and Extras So Nobody Steals the Whole Bowl
We all know that one kid who dumps the entire bowl into their bag. A sign and a few tricks keep things honest without you having to stand outside all night.
Pair this with your bowl and most kids actually listen. It won't stop every greedy teenager, but it slows them down enough that the bowl still has candy at 9 PM.
Way To Celebrate, Boo Framed Tabletop Sign
Stick this by the door so you can watch the candy bowl from your couch. Caught a kid last year dumping the whole thing and his mom made him bring it back. Worth every penny.
Battery Doorbell 2K
Swap your porch bulb for this and set it to orange or purple from your phone. The color change alone made three families stop to take photos in front of my house last October.
Kasa Smart Bulb, 850 Lumens, Full Color Changing
Use these to pre-portion candy into grab bags if you're leaving the bowl unattended. Two full-size bars per cup. It slows down the take-the-whole-bowl crowd and looks organized.
Hefty, Disposable Plastic Party Cups, 18 oz., Red, 50 count
Backup Candy for When You Run Out at 8 PM
First year I did full-size bars I bought exactly enough for 40 kids. We had 70. Running to the store in a panic at 7:45 PM in a half-zipped skeleton costume was not my proudest moment.
Get a backup pack of these and hide them inside. When the main bowl runs dry, you reload in 30 seconds and nobody on the sidewalk even notices the gap.
M&M's Variety Pack Full Size Milk Chocolate Candy Bars
Toss these in as your secret second wave. Twix flies under the radar compared to Reese's but every single adult who trick-or-treats with their kids quietly pockets one. Every time.
Twix Full Size Caramel Chocolate Cookie Candy Bar 1.79
Switch things up with these for the sugar-over-chocolate kids. My friend's daughter ranked every house last year and mine won specifically because I had these in the mix.
NERDS Gummy Clusters Candy 3 oz Rainbow
Throw this pack in the closet as your emergency supply. Sour Patch has a cult following with the 10 to 14 age group and handing them a full bag gets you actual gasps.
Sour Patch Kids