“We have been having a hard time with COVID just like everyone else,” said Jeff Jenkins, lodge administrator for the past four years. “Everyone has been staying home a lot.”

The annual children’s Christmas party could not be held in-person.

“The kids’ Christmas party had to be a drive-up Santa thing,” said Jenkins, a 20-year member of the Moose Lodge.

But Jolly Old Saint Nick was still able to get the gifts out, he said.

“They still got to see Santa, and he handed over a big bag of candy and a present,” Jenkins said.

The mission of the lodge includes: providing valuable service to the community, caring for children and teens in need at Mooseheart Child City and School, a 1,000-acre campus located 40 miles west of Chicago, and care for its senior members at Moosehaven, a 70-acre retirement community near Jacksonville, Florida.

“They (Mooseheart) take in kids where parents are separated or have drug problems,” Jenkins said.

“Mooseheart will interview them and take them in, feed them, educate them and put money away for scholarship, or if family gets back together, they have the option of having them come back home, too.”

The Fort Dodge Moose Lodge has 224 members who are men. It has 187 members who are women.

Jenkins said starting May 1, the Moose will become one. To this point, separate activities have been held for men’s and women’s groups.

Jenkins said he’s enjoyed being part of the lodge.

“One day my friends brought me down and introduced me,” he said. “I enjoyed it and decided to join. If you want to get involved in it, you can move up to different degrees to help kids and seniors.”

One popular Moose Lodge event locally is when the members make peanut brittle — a lot of it.

“We made 1,932 pounds of it this year,” Jenkins said.

The peanut brittle goes to the children at Mooseheart.

“We buy Christmas gift cards for the children of Mooseheart for children in Iowa,” Jenkins said.

Throughout the year, members of the Moose Lodge donate gift cards to veterans, cans of food for the Salvation Army and Tommy Moose stuffed animals to children’s hospitals, police and fire departments.

The women of the Moose donate to the Domestic/Sexual Assault Outreach Center.

The annual Easter egg hunt is scheduled to be the next big event for the Moose Lodge.

“We fill the Dodger football field with candy and rope it off with different age groups,” Jenkins said. “When the whistle blows, it’s a human vacuum and they suck up all the candy.”

Most recently, the Moose helped deliver a special Christmas for One Vision clients.

“We have a member who works for One Vision and they always have their annual Christmas here,” Jenkins said.

And even though the group couldn’t meet this year, the spirit of Christmas was kept alive.

“We still gave out wish lists to members and went out and bought a present off the wish list,” Jenkins said.

“We also bought gift cards for personal items they might need. We took it out to One Vision and distributed. Santa was there for that, too.”