Trails for Kids

Fresh Pumpkin Butter (made with homegrown Pumpkins)

This past weekend we had our annual Trails for Kids fundraising ride. We had to postpone it a little bit… because we all know there’s this Pandemic thing going on. Honestly, I think it was a good time. In April we’re always fighting rain. Now, if you think about September… you could fight fall rains, but you also have a little warmer temps… so who knows. It’s kind of hit and miss on both occasions. We actually discussed that during our follow-up board meeting.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves… first things first… a few weeks ago my I had to harvest my pumpkins early because of squash bugs. They were sitting in my wagon behind my house waiting for me to do something with them.

Jump forward a couple of weeks… I’ve now made some pumpkin purée, but I still have pumpkins running out of my tookus. That’s even with sitting a few up on the front porch for fall decór. And don’t read that wrong, I was extremely excited that I could grow pumpkins!! But my thought is, I don’t want them going to waste.

I was having conversations with my friend Jody on what we were each bringing to the bake sale at the Trails for Kids auction. She mentioned her dad was making biscuits for her to donate. She wasn’t sure if they’d be plain or cheesy/garlicky, but if they were plain, she was going to try and convince him to make Apple Butter. I mentioned since it was fall, she should also throw in some pumpkin butter. She laughed and said she a) didn’t have any, b) didn’t know how to make any, and c) didn’t have time to learn.

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3-2-1 Cake Mix and Cake

This weekend was special. It is our annual Trails for Kids fundraiser. If you have been here anytime at all… you know that usually, we have this ride in April. Also… this year has been “interesting” (to say the least!) so we had to postpone until this past weekend. All summer long we wondered if it would even happen. I mean seriously…

But the time came and it did, in fact, happen! I can’t give away any of the details on the ride just yet but know, it was a MAJOR success! That would be an understatement!

On Friday night of our fundraiser, we have a bake sale. A few years ago I had a chocolate chip cookie in a cast-iron skillet go for $130. Well, this year I had something go for more than that… but that’s another story for another time :). Yup, I’m mean.

Today I want to share a recipe I’ve shared before… BUT… the cool thing is this is perfect for camping. And since this fundraiser involves camping, what better time to share, am I right?

3-2-1 Cake Mix & Cake

Ingredients for Cake Mix Setup:

  • A box of Angel Food Cake mix
  • A box of your favorite flavor of cake (chocolate, funfetti, lemon, you name it!)
  • A ziplock bag

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The Duck Race

If you’ve been paying attention to the weather around the country any this week, then you’ll know the Midwest was supposed to get hit with a HUGE potential of Severe Thunderstorms/Tornadic weather. I woke up this morning to a HUGE bang of thunder. I always say that all we need is a good thunderstorm and all trees just blossom BAM! Yup, I was right.

The other thing to note is we’re on baby watch 2018. No… not me. The horse’s sillies. One mare is 1 week overdue and the other is about 2 weeks out. With crappy weather like this, I halfway expected to walk out and find 2 babies on the ground. So far, notta.

But there is a light rain going on and by the time I was done feeding critters, I’m kind of soggy. Which reminds me of a day not too long ago that I got soggy. Let me explain…

Jared carrying me to shore on his back. Tori walking along side.

The Duck Race

A couple weekends ago we were helping out with Trails for Kids. One of the events to raise money is the Duck Race. We sell little toy ducks that float for $2/each or 3 for $5. Then we go to Sugar Creek, the creek that runs right alongside the campground. We dump them in, and the winner wins half the pot of money collected. Easy enough, right? Sure… (more…)

Trails for Kids 2016

{WARNING: Picture Overload… again…}

So what we were up to this last weekend? Well it involved friends, camping, and horses. What more could you ask for? Hubby took Thursday off and he and Jared worked on moving horses, trailers, stuff down to Underwood’s Crag O’Lea in Pineville, MO, for the weekends adventures. I met Karen after I got out of school and picked up Abug and she got off work, then we headed down.

The evenings meal consisted of Steak and potatoes. A good kind of hearty meal :).

Then our friends Tony & Stephanie couldn’t get power to their camper, so the men went to work trying to rewire the box and figure out why. And just like that (you know like 20 minutes later, not bad) they had power. Woot woot! Nothing like rewiring by flashlight. Tony had a flashlight on his head and every time he’d look away hubby would grumble at him because he took the light.

Then we wandered down to the tent. I guess I should tell you this weekend was Trails for Kids. It is to raise money for the Tri-County CP Center.

Once we got to the tent, we checked out the lighting that hubby/Grady/Jared/Jason helped wire up. There was a dance floor so I turned on baby girls favorite song, “Girl Crush” and she and daddy danced. Then Jared tried to teach her how to break dance.

Friday morning our plans were breakfast and then to hit the trails. We had Bacon and Eggs and steak left over from Thursday night. They got out tortillas and cheese and made breakfast burritos. I knew Jared came into the camper looking for cheese but it wasn’t until my second burrito that I actually found the cheese. I made the comment I thought cheese would make it better, but it really didn’t. And if you look at the plate of bacon, a few pieces are burnt to a crisp… I had them on my second burrito. I wound up not eating the whole thing. The burnt bacon was not so yummy but the other bacon was excellent! We also had hubby’s candied jalapeños. YUM!

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Trails for Kids 2015

This weekend was a busy weekend. I was holding off on this post a bit for some numbers to add to it. Now that I have those let’s get started. (be warned this is a photo heavy post!) First thing Saturday morning. I’m talking FIRST. THING. My alarm went off at 5:30am and I was up before it. We were headed to Pineville, MO to Underwood’s Crag O’Lea for a Trails for Kid’s benefit ride.

And I promise, Devil Dawg is okay… she wanted a belly rub. I just tripped over her and she still laid like that so I took her picture. (The red is coming off trailer lights)

We planned on taking Blonde Barbie but she refused to load into the trailer. Not sure why so after trying for 30 minutes and starting to run late, we decided to leave her home. The crazy part was Aloha refused to load too and Aloha has NEVER refused to load?!?! Sorry about the poor quality but it was cloudy, 6:15ish and I lightened this photo so you could see her 🙂 (more…)