Careful as we are all year, we seem to lose our inhibitions against junk food when Halloween rolls around - snacking on the sugar-laden treats we bought for neighbors' children as well as the ones our own children bring home from their trick-or-treating. Here are some tips for resisting temptation:

• Buy treats only a day or so before Halloween, so they're not around long to tempt you.
• Keep the treats in an inconvenient, difficult-to-reach place until Halloween arrives.
• Buy treats which you don't particularly like, making it easier to resist
• Buy healthy mini-packs of:
• Raisins or other dried fruit
• 100% juice
• Sugar-free hot chocolate mix
• Trail mix
• Cheese and crackers
• Sugar-free gum
• Buy non-edible treats such as stick-on temporary tattoos, mini bottles of bubble bath or blow bubbles, costume accessories such as wax false teeth or a stick-on mustache or sidewalk
  chalk.
• Take your children out after dinner - when you're not hungry.
• Go through the "goodie bag" when you arrive home, discarding any outrageously unhealthy treats or those with questionable packaging.
• Put the remaining edible treats in that same difficult-to-reach place, to be dispensed one at a time on a scheduled basis (such as dessert time).
• When you yourself get that urge to indulge, take a look at your watch and wait ten minutes (if you're lucky, you'll get distracted and forget about the urge).
• Set a date - maybe two weeks after Halloween-when you'll dump the leftovers.

So, plan ahead and, when it comes to the leftovers, think "waist" instead of "waste!"