Trunk or Treat: Halloween Alternative at Church

As you are planning your Fall schedule of events for the children in your church, consider a Halloween alternative that's catching on: Trunk-or- Treat. Trunk-or-Treat combines the fun of trick or treating with the safety of having the event at your church. And it's a great way to involve your entire congregation in your children's ministry.

I like to present Trunk-or-Treat as a celebration of Fall's harvest. When our church decorates for trunk-or-treat you won't see any ghosts, goblins, witches or ghouls. No bats, vampires or monsters. What you will see instead is lots of pumpkins, gourds, apples, corn stalks and mums. Nothing scary is allowed. That goes for costumes as well for both children and adults.

We usually have our Trunk-or-Treat on the Sunday evening closest to Halloween since we are presenting it as a Halloween alternative. We only offer it to the children of our church but if you want to offer it as an outreach ministry to the community, schedule your event for Halloween night.

Trunk-or-Treat works best when it's set up in two parts: game booths and trunks. If you plan a two hour event, schedule game booths for the kids inside your building during the first half then trunks outside in the parking lot for the second half. Consider a costume parade in between to transition the kids from game booths to trunks.

If you have an active youth group, ask them to run your game booths. Some suggestions for booths include: go fish, bobbing for apples, pumpkin bowling, cookie decorating, duck pond and ring toss. Sand art, hair spray painting and pumpkin carving can also be offered but will require adult supervision. If your space and budget allows, you might want to offer a dunking booth or jumping house, too.

You can hand out small Christian themed prizes at each booth. I like to purchase mine from www.orientaltrading.com. If you order them early enough, you can get free shipping and other discounts.

Ask each trunk to provide their own candy. Make sure it is individually wrapped and avoid home baked goods if possible. Always over-estimate the amount of candy needed. It's better to have too much than too little.

You might want to have a trunk contest and offer a prize to the best themed trunk. I never cease to be amazed at some of the trunks that show up each year. Amazed in a good way. We have had trunks with fishing themes ("Fishers or Men"), ocean themes ("Jonah and the Whale"), sheep themes ("The Good Shepherd" "The Black Sheep") and animals ("Noah's Ark"). Last year we had a lady with a red VW bug who put big black stick-on dots all over her car and dressed herself like a ladybug. THAT was creative! So you can see that Trunk-or-Treat can be a fun event for kids of all ages!

One final note: don't forget to take LOTS of photos of your Trunk-or-Treat event. It will help you remember how fantastic your event was and remind you how to set it up next year!