I wanted to post this message I received from the father of 2 of the winners of my annual kids contest. THIS is why we put this on every year!!!

"Good evening Joe, and Merry Christmas! Once again, thank you very much for such a great opportunity. I can tell you that the kids here are always eagerly waiting to hear about the contest announcement each year. I wish you could have been there to hear the cheers and excitement last night as I read the results. It made Matthew and Ryan’s day, they went to bed very excited."

NOW, I have something to say.... I realize that everyone is very busy during the Christmas holiday, but I have to say I was surprised and a little disappointed that no one posted a single word of encouragement or praise to these kid's and their entries this year! Nobody. No "Nice job, kids!" "Way to go!" "Great story!" Nothing. Am I out of line to post this? Are these kids efforts not worth a few seconds to say, "well done!"? I would hope so. Well, I'll hush up now. I just wanted to say that we would certainly welcome anybody to post some praise and cheer these kids on and acknowledge their efforts. We look forward to putting this on again next year, and thank you Paul Dobbins for allowing us to do so!

Joe Goodman & Family

Congratulations to everyone that had a hand in this. My favorite part was that most listed a parent or sibling as there favorite trapper. I'm 55 years old and my favorite trapper is still my Dad. In a time of video games and laptops it provided something different. Thanks Joe for offering something different and Congrats again to all the winners !!

I greatly enjoyed them and was impressed with each kids writing. I overlooked the contest this year or I would have seen if my boys wanted to enter. They have enjoyed some contest on here before.

I feel making comments on each story would have made the thread harder to read each entry and some may have gotten over looked by members enjoying the stories. So maybe this could be a place for those congratulations and we'll dones on the stories. Again I greatly enjoyed the storied the kids wrote and the art work as well.

Congratulations to all who entered. Any one of you could have a writing career in your future. Keep up the good work.

What contest?? I haven't been on here much till about a week or two ago. I'm going to have to look for this info and see what took place. I own Timberline Sporting Goods in Rifle, Colorado, and would love to see these ideas on getting kids involved. If ya don't mind, I may steal these ideas to use at the store.

The kids are why we do this. Reach the kids, get them started early, and we reach many generations to come.

Edit: Wow- went back and found it. I don't know how I missed seeing that! Right at the top of the page!!! I'll admit, I never even look at those posts, I just look for the new entries on the threads. I'll be paying attention from now on. Great idea for a contest!

^^^^yeah, me too. Great stories kids!

Thank you folks for responding. These kids are our future, let's prop 'em up!!!