By EMRY DINMAN

Staff Writer

MOSES LAKE — On a cold November morning, Kelsie Eddie stood in the parking lot of a local church wearing a splay-eyed turkey hat she bought from Amazon, jumping up to hand off T-shirts to participants in the 10th Annual Turkey Trot.

A decade ago and a senior in high school, Eddie chose to do something meaningful with her senior project. Having lost her grandparents to cancer, she decided to create a fun run to raise money for the Columbia Basin Cancer Foundation, where participants would pick up T-shirts in Blue Heron Park, run across town by the hundreds, and return to the park to cross the finish line.

Ten years later, and the trot across town is still run by Eddie, as well as her friends and family, she said.

“It went so good the first year, so why would I not just keep doing it?” Eddie asked. “It just brightens people’s lives; so many survivors and fighters come to this, and so many people who have lost someone, like myself.”

Her husband, Andrew Eddie, designs the T-shirts that are given away each year, and those shirts are printed by Moses Lake-based Shirt Builders, she said. In the last few years, there also has been racing support by BuDu Racing, an Auburn-based company that Eddie used to work for, she said.

Things have, of course, been different this year, as the normal crush of hundreds of people packing into the park is not the recommendations of public health officials. Instead of a single day, the event began Saturday and will continue until 5 p.m. Sunday, and racers will donate online and participate virtually.

While the event hasn’t gotten the kind of traction it typically does, falling short of the 200-300 participants during an average year, there were 79 people signed up for the virtual run by Saturday morning, Eddie said.

To sign up before the end of the week, visit runsignup.com and search for “Moses Lake Turkey Trot 2020.”