Holy Halloween Candy, Batman!

So, my kids... two Captains, a princess and a "mom"... went out trick-or-treating on Monday.  Sheesh!  Because of these characters:

we ended up with this:

No lie... maybe 500-600 pieces?  Ugh.

I'm no dummy.  I know who's home the majority of the day, and who is not.  I know who is going to eat the majority of this candy every single time she walks past the pile... and who will make a special effort to walk to that pile even if she's in the middle of a major project, so I needed a plan.  

I've done this part in year's past.  I had each kid choose 30 pieces of candy... to last one-per-day through November until the Advent Calendar begins.  We did it in rounds, to make sure everyone had a fair chance of getting what they wanted.

I spread the candy all out so everyone can see, give each child a big plastic container with their names on them, and start yelling out the round number.  "ONE"... and each kid puts one piece in their container.  We continue through thirty.

No one can complain about who gets what candy... everyone has an equal opportunity.

 At the end of Round 30, I then scoot everyone away from the table (to avoid last minute grabs) and count their containers.  Yes, I cannot trust all of the kids to only have 30 pieces.  LOL  In fact, the two young'uns had 31.  Ha!  See?

If you notice in the above photo, there's room for more.  Shhhh..... I suppose we could've done more, but by November 30, I'm tired of seeing candy everywhere!

Then each day after Halloween for the month of November, they get one piece of candy.

The problem was that even after gathering up those 120 pieces of candy, we still had this:

Last year, I saved a few chocolate bars and tossed the rest.  I didn't want to do that this year....

NOW what to do?  So, I did what I do when I have burning questions buzzing through my mind... I asked my friends on Facebook!

Some mentioned schools, donating to soldiers, buy-backs from dentists, party favors, pinatas, and more.

Here's what I did.

I had my oldest, who was still hanging around, help me sort the candy.  First we gathered all good chocolate (BRAND name stuff).  Then we bagged it for the freezer.  Isn't just about any candy bar 10x better when frozen?

Then, we started making piles of types of candy:

GUM

TOOTSIE ROLLS,  STARBURST, LIFESAVERS, etc.

With the plain milk chocolate bars and the "off brand" chocolates, I bagged them up to put in the pantry.  

Why?

Doesn't EVERYONE have a "S'mores Basket" in their pantry?

Then I unbagged all the mini bags of M&Ms and set them in a ziploc for the next time we have guests (Thanksgiving?) for setting out in a candy dish.

I emailed the kids' teachers to see if any were planning on making special projects over the next few holidays.  Sure enough... they are!  One is making ice cream sundaes soon, so she's getting any "sprinkle"-type candies:  Nerds, mini Whoppers, mini gumdrops, etc.  Another teacher is making gingerbread houses in December.  So, he's getting all the other goodies great for decorating houses:  Smarties, Lifesavers, Tootsie Rolls (for lamp-posts) and more.  

So, I was down to just about 10% of the candy.  I found a few other ideas that I'm hoping to do.  I kept some Tootsie Rolls... did you know you can make Tootsie Roll Rice Krispies Treats and Tootsie Roll Fudge?

What did you do with all those goodies?