Halloween Safety Tips

Halloween is meant to be fun, but when children are involved it's important to make sure that their safety comes above everything else. Here are some quick and easy tips for keeping your children safe this year, without sacrificing any of the fun!

Halloween Safety Tips for Children
Halloween Safety Tips for Adults
Safety Tips for Halloween Parties

Halloween Safety Tips for Children

• Make sure your child's costume is reflective and easily seen by passing motorists. Add reflective tape if necessary. Also be sure that their costumes are short enough to keep them from tripping, getting tangled, or coming into contact with flames. Also, make sure the eye holes are large enough for good peripheral vision.
• Make sure that if your child is carrying a prop, such as a scythe, butcher knife or a pitchfork, that the tips are smooth and flexible enough to not cause injury if fallen on.
• Discreetly add your child's name, address and telephone number inside their costume, or on a bracelet or necklace.
• Stay together as a group if going out to Trick or Treat without an adult.
• Stop only at familiar houses in your own neighborhood unless they are accompanied by an adult.
• Halloween masks can impair a child's ability to see clearly; consider using non-toxic and hypoallergenic make-up instead.
• When you're shopping for a costume or elements to make one of your own, make sure the label guarantees that they are flame retardant.
• Make sure your children have flashlights with fresh batteries.
• Depending on the age of the child (or children) going trick-or-treating, make sure that they have an adult guardian with them at all times.
• Only trick-or-treat on well-lit streets, and in neighbourhoods you trust. Also, only knock on the doors of homes with their porch light on, or a jack-o-lantern.
• Never eat anything that already opened, and do not eat anything until it has been checked by an adult. Though tampering with Halloween candy is much more rare than people may think, it is still important to check everything before it is eaten, and all opened, spoiled or suspicious items should be thrown away.
• Know the route your kids will be taking if you aren't going with them.
• The best bet is to make sure that an adult is going with them. If you can't take them, see if another parent or a teen aged sibling can go along.

Halloween Safety Tips for Adults

• Instruct your children not to cut through back alleys and fields. Make sure they know to stay in populated and lighted places.
• Explain to children the difference between tricks and vandalism. Throwing eggs at a house may seem like fun but they need to know the other side of the coin as well, clean up and damages can ruin Halloween. If they are caught vandalizing, make them clean up the mess they've made.
• Make sure you set a time that the children should be home by and explain how important it is for them to be home on time.
• Know what other activities a child may be attending, such as parties, school or mall functions.
• Instruct your children not to eat any treats until they bring them home to be examined by you.
• Explain to your kids that animal cruelty is not acceptable. Make sure that they know that harming animals is not only morally wrong but punishable by law and will not be tolerated.
• Instruct your child to never go into the home or a car of a stranger.
• Children should go trick or treating during daylight hours only unless accompanied by a responsible adult.
• Small children should never be allowed to go out alone on Halloween. Make sure an older sibling or adult is with them.
• Teaching your children basic everyday safety such as looking both ways before crossing streets and crossing when the lights tell you to, will help make them safer when they are out Trick or Treating.
• Kids always want to help with the pumpkin carving. Small children shouldn't be allowed to use a sharp knife to cut the top or the face. There are many kits available that come with tiny saws that work better then knives and are safer, although you can be cut by them as well. It's best to let the kids clean out the pumpkin and draw a face on it, which you can carve for them.
• Plan a safe route so you know where your children will be at all times. Make sure that your child is old enough and responsible enough to go out by themselves.
• If you set jack-o-lanterns on your porch with candles in them, make sure that they are far enough out of the way so that kids costumes won't accidentally be set on fire.

Safety Tips for Halloween Parties

• If you are holding the party in your house, make sure that you move any breakable pieces of furniture to another room where they can't get broken.
• If using dry ice in a punch bowl, make sure that the person serving keeps any dry ice chips out of drinks! It can cause severe injury if ingested.
• Make sure that any walk ways are far enough away from things so that people can't trip over them or hurt themselves.
• If you have a lot of Jack-O-Lanterns, you might want to try a battery powered light source or light sticks to light them instead of candles. This cuts down on the fire hazards, such as catching costumes or props on fire.
• If you use real candles, make sure there is no chance of anything blowing into the flames that could start a fire.
• If you are using fake blood, make sure that it won't be coming in contact with anything stainable like visitors, pets and children.
• If you are planning a party for your kids and their friends, see if you can get some of the other parents to help out with the planning, baking and what ever else needs to be done.
• To keep things moving for either an adult party or child's party, make sure that you have some games, like a scavenger hunt or a murder mystery planned in advance.