A few Christmases ago, Abby gifted me with a shirt stating: “I was normal two huskies ago.” At the time we laughed and thought it referred to Balto and Jenna. We had no idea how prophetic the shirt actually was as now we’re managing a house of four huskies! Well played, Abby; well played.

I haven’t really shared much here about how mushing is going for Ian. During the running season, we get so busy with helping Ian, that I don’t really think about journaling it when we get home. To be honest, I’m tired and usually a little sore. Handling huskies has turned out to be a high impact activity that I wasn’t quite ready for. I thought I was ready. I can manage 1,000 pound horses, after all! Oh how wrong I was. Pound for pound, horses are the easier beasts for sure.

When dogs are excited and ready to run, they are ready to run right then. The mushing community debates amongst themselves if mushing dogs should be taught to stand quietly, or if it’s better to let the dogs psych themselves up for the run. I don’t know enough to weigh in with my opinion yet, but I really enjoy seeing Falcon’s enthusiasm when he knows he’s about to go for a run. Once he’s on the gang line, he jumps up and down in the air. Even Balto gets excited now and barks and pulls, ready to go! Baby Shallot is learning, and by the end of this last season she was starting to find her voice. She prefers to “woo” rather than bark. I can’t wait to see her gain more confidence this fall and show us her enthusiasm. She loves to run more than any of Ian’s other dogs.

To keep the dogs from running before Ian is ready, he uses a snub line to hold them in place. This line works great, but first we have to get them to the line. This is where I have the most trouble. During Ian’s first season of mushing, I fell down almost every single day. I turned Falcon loose in the state forest back before he responded to recall commands. I mashed his paws. I tripped over the gang line, dog paws, and my own feet on the regular. Ian frequently had to jump off his rig to show me the correct way to hold a dog, clip on a neck line, attach a tug, or get out of the way. He took to mushing, and all the associated tasks, like a fish to water, while I was like a bull in a China shop. Eventually Ian and Falcon have trained me up to not make quite as many mistakes. But those first few months were a little rough. Daily I asked Bonnie, Shantel, Cruz, and even Kim for advice as I kept making errors. Brinn was definitely more competent than me, but he was usually driving ahead of Ian. For that first season, Ian mostly ran on maintained roads in Standing Stone State Forrest. Hunters, hikers, horses, and ATV riders all used these roads (though they weren’t often out on the single digit days like us) and we wanted to have a vehicle in between Ian and any potential head on traffic.

This past season, Ian started running more dirt trails on the other side of Standing Stone, and he has also started running the Meadow Trail at Cummins Falls State Park. There is no motorized traffic on these trails, so Ian has become the fastest moving traffic! Now Brinn hikes in ahead of Ian so that he’s in place to offer trail help at tricky turns, and also to hold up hikers so they’re not having to dodge dogs running down the trail.

Ian is becoming even more proficient at readying his own dogs by himself now. He appreciates some help unloading dogs and clipping them to the trailer, but after he sets his snub line, he’s pretty adept at getting them to the gang line by himself. He’ll ask me to hold Falcon and Shallot apart once their neck line goes on, then I have to make sure I’m out of the way because Ian gets ready pretty quickly. Once he pulls the pin, the whole team is GONE!