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Puzzle #50: This Year, No Children (Cryptic)

 Holy cow, a cryptic!


It's the one-year anniversary of this blog! Thanks to everyone who's solved any of my puzzles along the way.

This week, to celebrate Half Baked's birthday, we're back in cryptic land. I feel like I learned a ton making this puzzle, and I hope at least some of that comes across in the clues. 

 

A huge thanks to Steve, who has both easy and trickier cryptics on Square Pursuit, and k0rmad-- they both were invaluable in their help critiquing this puzzle, and it wouldn't be half as good without them. Any errors/mistakes are mine alone.


This puzzle has a hidden theme! It's meant to be solved without any knowledge of the theme, so feel free to ignore it. If you'd like to try to puzzle it out, the first hint is the title.


Hint #2:

 

 (Theme explanation down below)

 Best of luck in solving, and I'd love to hear your feedback! Constructing a cryptic is a lot of work, but very fun, and I appreciated all the feedback on my first.

.puz     

PDF 

Solution

 

Mmm, peppermint Oreos!





Theme explanation (spoilers)

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