Feeding America Fundraising Goal -- 50% There!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful winter vacation.  We are -- Christmas week is always an enjoyable stretch of time at our house.  My birthday falls on the 22nd, Alex's falls on the 28th (she's now eleven), and, of course, there's Christmas on the 25th.

This year, in the midst of all the celebrating, we had a lovely surprise.  We logged in to our Feeding America fundraising page and discovered we've already reached 50% of our goal.  To those who have donated -- thank you!  If you haven't already donated, please consider doing so in the next few days.  Your contributions are tax-deductible, so if you donate before January 1, you'll give yourself a slight break on your 2013 returns.  Every cent goes directly to Feeding America.

Our training continues in the form of our usual weekly mountain hiking.  You can follow our New Hampshire all-season peak adventures on our main blog, www.trishalexsage.com.  The girls hike once a week and I usually hike twice a week.  Once we have our JMT permits secured, I'll begin posting more JMT-specific info (gear, resupply plans, etc.) on this JMT-specific webpage.  Also, once spring arrives, the girls will increase their NH mountain hiking to two or three days a week, and I'll increase mine to three or four days a week.

Ascending Mt. Jackson (NH), December 23, 2013.
Here's hoping for a fun 2013-2014 winter hiking season! 

Happy New Year, folks.  I'll post again next week.  In the meantime, please consider donating to Feeding America, and come join us on our main blog, www.trishalexsage.com.

Permits and Training Hikes

Hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving holiday.  The girls and I traveled up and down the East Coast visiting relatives and playing tourist at various cities.  We're finally back in New Hampshire.  Our weekly White Mountain hikes will resume this month; trip reports will be posted on our main blog, www.trishalexsage.com.

I can't post much in the way of readying ourselves for the JMT until I secure our permits.  We can't secure our permits until 24 weeks before our intended departure date.  Everybody and their brother wants to hike the JMT during the same weeks we want to hike it, so I'm a bit nervous about being able to reserve those permits...once those permits are indeed secured, I can relax and move forward with all the other planning details.  Therefore, almost all the prep posts for this trip will be written after February 2014.  The superstitious part of me worries I'll jinx everything if I write any prep posts before those permits are set in stone.

One thing I can say is that we'll continue to hike the Whites from now until the time we leave for California.  I call those little adventures "training hikes," but really, they're just our usual weekly mountain hikes.  As mentioned above, you can see the trip reports for our White Mountain hikes at www.trishalexsage.com.

Don't forget about Feeding America!  At the end of this month, we'll have reached about 30% of our goal.  Once our permits our secured, I'll start getting more aggressive with my fundraising pitches.  :)  You can still donate in the meantime, though!

Happy hiking,
Trish