first camping trip and hike with my wife.

Me and my wife finished up our first camping trip including a 2 mile hike through the hills of Johnson shut ins state park in mo. yeah me and her definately need to get better outfitted and in better shape before we go for any heavy backpacking trips.

Sounds like you started out right: being aware of your limits, and doing something well within them in order to assess your abilities and needs (both in terms of conditioning and gear.) You forgot to give us the most important piece of information: did you have enough fun that you are reasonably enthusiastic about going out again? (Gearing up is details - and there are a bunch of us here who take great delight in sharing those details with you!)

Ask lots of questions, and we'll all try to help.

Yeah i had fun. my wife said she did too.
We have plans to do another camping trip in a couple of months outfitted like we were backpacking. to see how the food choices and gear we have work out.
Yeah the weekend was interesting first day raining the next 2 cold at night. and we were only set up for occasional rain and mild temps. We arent going to do that again.

The key here is not to go heavy!

You can stay reasonably light even on a budget.

Have you read the articles and gear lists on the home page of this site, left-hand column?

My neighbor used to live near Johnson Shut Ins. I haven't been yet but he's said it's pretty sweet.

We did have a cool spell there a few days ago so I'm guessing that's when you went. After my first couple Summer excursions into our forests I decided to wait until late October to start my backpacking season. The last week has always been pretty much bug free, so that's when I start.

The main thing to remember about backpacking the Ozarks is that most all our miles here are pretty tough compared to most other places you might go in the U.S. Aparently Ozarkers either never heard of, or just don't like, switchbacks, so your either on a ridge or going straight up or down our steep hills. It's mostly up, as I'm sure you noticed.

I like to keep my trip plans under 6 miles a day, and quite often I'll do just half of that. That way I can take my time and rest a lot and enjoy the great views and super scenic spots we have here. You'll be surprised at how fast your legs and lungs will build up. If you walk even a mile or two a few times a week it will make a big difference. But I assure you, if you can comfortably do 6-8 miles a day on an average Ozark hiking trail you can pretty much double that distance on trails like the AT or PCT, so don't feel bad about doing just a couple miles because those are pretty tough miles.

Beside, you can find some spectacular spots here just a couple miles from a trailhead, and have them all to yourself too, so keep at it, you'll be rewarded.

sorry what i meant was long backpacking trips. I don't plan on packing everything but the kitchen sink.
Going to work with my dehydrator to make our food. I have heard that will lighten the load.

I had a list i worked off of. But we made some decisions in regard to money and gear. For example we borrowed an airmatress but didn't attempt to set it up before we went. When we were setting up found out that the airmatress was bigger than our tent.
And because it was summer and i didn't think that it would turn extremely chilly we just had one sleeping bag to lay down on and i only brought a sheet.
lol now i know better

oh i understand. This trail had switch backs but once you got past the cliff face. It got a lot tougher. Going up by a creek but the climb was alomst straight up a rock face.

It's a great idea to go on a trip with a short hike when testing out new gear, too - not just when you're testing out your own abilities! New tent, new shoes, new backpacks -- you don't want to be too far from home when you find out it's not good. You found that out with the air mattress!

I read in a hiking book that the author never hiked more than 5 miles on her first day. She didn't explain why, though, just said that she liked to take it easy and enjoy the trip. But this is why - if your gear fails, you're only a couple hours away from the car.

I know this from experience. I have been 2 hours away from the car when I realized it was too darn cold for the stuff I brought and hypothermia was a definite possibility if we stayed the night. I have also hiked 6 hours and found out that we didn't bring tent poles.

Yeah.

It rained, too. Our tent was held together with branches, scrunchies, and shoelaces.

Yeah. thats why we are taking it slow. I konw both me and her are out of shape and definately need to work on getting our trail legs.