Ivy HErman's father had been transferred to another city. The family had to sell the kennel of Canadian Eskimo Dogs they raised. Ivy is elated when her favoutite dog, Snow Queen and her team mates fine an outstanding 'forever home'.

An Outstanding ’Forever Home”.


For Sale: A dog team

“I received an answer to my advertisement I ran in several dog mushing magazines,” Mr. Herman announced.
Ivy’s heart sank. She braced herself to hear what might come next.
“What ad?” Josiah, a year younger than Ivy, asked.
“I didn’t know you had placed an ad in any dog magazines,” Nathan said.
“We can’t take a kennel full of dogs to live with us in the city,” Ms. Herman said “And we do need to sell the dogs and this kennel.”
Ivy remained silent. Suddenly the steaming, thick stew in a bowl in front of her, and a freshly baked biscuit in one hand, that had smelled and looked so delicious only moments before, seemed uninviting and tasteless. She set her spoon on the table with a clatter.
“What’s the matter, Ivy?” Mr. Herman asked.
“Eat your stew,” Mrs. Herman said. She put her own spoon her bowl, put the spoon to her lips and swallowed.
“I’m not hungry,” Ivy answered. She pushed her bowl away.
“But beef stew is your favourite,” Mrs. Herman said.
Ivy didn’t pick up her spoon and resume eating. Josiah looked at her as if she had lost her mind.
“She doesn’t like this stew?”
Ivy rolled her eyes. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I said I’m not hungry.”
“This is delicious,” Nathan said. He dipped his biscuit into the thick stew, bit off a piece and smacked his lips.
“To get back to the ad,” Mr. Herman said. He swallowed his stew and continued. “I received a letter from Mr. Owen Winschell, Sr. who said he and his son, Owen, Jr., want to buy Snow Queen.”
“Oh, Dad nooooo.” Ivy bent down to pet Snow Queen who had curled up at her feet beneath the dining table. The Canadian Eskimo Dog licked her fingers.
Her father’s lips tightened.
He’s angry with me; now he will yell at me, thought Ivy.
Instead, he said to his two sons.
“Mr. Winschell offered a good price. He said he and his son already raise Alaskan Malamutes and have won trophies regularly in races. Owen Jr. wants to have a team of Canadian Eskimo dogs of his own.”
“He came to the right place,” Josiah stated.
“We have lots for sale,” Nathan added.
Mrs. Herman smiled.
“Your Dad’s job relocating him took care of that.”
‘Mom, I believe you are GLAD we’re moving to the city,” Ivy said. “I’ll stay here and continue to raise and train my sled dogs. Snow Queen is My dog. I raised her from the day she was born and I’ll do what I want with her.”
Snow Queen, hearing her name, raised her head, whined and licked Ivy’s toes.
“You are too young to be on your own,” Mr. Herman said.
“Can’t I take her to the city with me?” Ivy pleaded.
Mrs. Herman shook her head. “She will need a lot of walking.”
“I would walk her every day,” Ivy promised. She glanced at her father. His mind was elsewhere and he hadn’t heard her pleas.
“No,” Mrs. Herman said firmly. She’d finished eating and began piling empty dishes but did not get up to carry them to the sink. “Snow Queen is a working husky; she would never adjust to city life.”
A long moment of silence settled over the table. Mr. Herman looked from Nathan to Josiah, Mrs. Herman to Ivy.
“It isn’t just Snow Queen Mr. Winschell wants to buy,” he revealed belatedly.
“It isn’t?”
“Then how many does he want to buy?” Josiah wanted to know.
“The entire kennel?” Nathan asked.
“His son wants to buy the entire team; Snow Queen and her four littermates, your entire team,” Mr. Herman explained.
This really shook Ivy up. She sat forward with her arms on the table and buried her face in her arms. She didn’t like being helpless to stop the sale of her own dogs right from under her. She said, her words muffled. “No! He can’t have my dogs. I trained them myself. Snow Queen, Shadow...”
At the mention of Shadow’s name, the whole family had a good laugh. If she didn’t keep a constant vigilant on the dog, Shadow would immediately find some way to get into mischief and disrupt the team.
Ivy sat up straight, determined not to allow the lack of the family’s sympathy towards her pleadings make her angry.
“Red, King and Pepper,” Ivy continued as if no one had interrupted. “I can’t just hand them over to someone else. It’s scary to think what might happen to them. Mr. Winschell might abuse them all- or Snow Queen.”
“Mr. Winschell gave me the URL to his website,” Mr. Herman said. “We will check on it later. We should be able to tell how he and his son treats animals by what we see there.”
Ivy wasn’t convinced.
“I’ll think about Mr. Winschell’s offer and let him know,” Mr. Herman said.
Ivy knew this was the best she would hear this evening. Grateful for any reprieve, she nodded. She got up from the table and hurried to her room.

Sleep did not come easily to Ivy that night. It was the first part of August, the nights had been hot and humid for- Ivy couldn’t remember how long- most of the summer likely. Anyway, she longed for what she remembered Northern Saskatchewan summer nights to be- as high as 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day but cooling as much as twenty degrees overnight to make sleeping easier. Tonight she tossed and turned. She would lie on one side for awhile then turn over on the other side. This kept up for well into the night.
The moon was almost at its full stage. She considered herself lucky she could view the moon as it bathed the earth below in its golden glow across a clear night sky. In the winter the moon phase always meant extremely cold nights and sometimes temperatures didn’t rise very much during the day either. She longed for some of that crispness in the air now. She kicked the covers off.
The moonlight shone through her window, creating a blue patch on the floor by her bed. Watching the moon’s silent march in its path, and its glow on the earth- Ivy remembered to say a prayer. She jumped out of bed and knelt by her bed.
“Father in heaven. I pray that you will provide good homes for Snow Queen and the other four dogs; and all five will go to the same home. Amen.”
With those words in her heavenly Father’s ears, she slid back under the covers and pulled them around her, snuggling into their warmth. She smiled, feeling content. With a sigh she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

The next morning she awakened late for her. Her blue eyes opened to the smell of breakfast, beautiful aromas tantalized her nose, but her stomach rebelled. She got out of bed and looked out the window. Beautiful golden sunlight greeted her. Quickly she changed from her long ankle length nightgown into a clean pair of blue jeans, socks, shoes and a cotton short- sleeved shirt with a blue, denim-look collar and cuffs.





























Ivy’s Last Run





She went down the stairs to find the rest of the family still at the breakfast table. Ivy kissed her father then her mother and greeted her brothers with a cheery “good-morning”. Someone had taken Snow Queen outside and tethered her in the dog yard with the rest of the sled dogs.
“Mom, Dad may I take the team out for an exercise run before it gets too hot for them?”
“It already is,” Mrs. Herman said. “It’s a scorcher out there and it’s only mid-morning,”
“All right,” Mr. Herman consented.
Ivy was delighted. She turned and started for the door.
“Don’t stay out too long,” Mrs. Herman cautioned. Ivy waved a hand to indicate she heard.
Nathan pushed back his chair and stood up and followed his older sister outside to help harness the dogs.

Ivy already had the four-wheeled dogcart in position, waiting for the five dogs to be fastened to it. Ivy reeled out the gangline. The modern carts were, and this one especially, was the ultimate in summer overland traveling with dogs. It came equipped with elastomer suspension, providing a very smooth ride, four wheel drum brakes and seating the seating was comfortable. Hers was a one eat cart. The cart was easy to get in and out of.
The gangline was a lightweight but strong, usually nylon, rope that fastened to the front of the cart, long enough to accommodate five dogs, and fastened to the wring on the back of the lead dog’s harness.
Also fastened to this gangline were the tug lines, these were individual lines, or a trace used in horse hitching terms, which attached to the harness of each dog and then to the gangline.
Necklines fasted from to the dog’s collar to the gangline, this kept the dogs in neat rows, pulling evenly. Ivy had all this ready so Nathan hurried and unsnapped Snow Queen from where someone had tethered her in her place in the dog yard last night.
The rest of the dogs started jumping around and barking, all wanting to get in on the run.
Nathan snapped Snow Queen in the lead. The Queen was definitely the most intelligent of the five dogs and the quickest to obey the handler’s commands. She pulled, alone, at the head of the team.
Ivy brought Shadow who was mostly white with a red head. Shadow was the mischievous one but she did not cause trouble today. She had jumped around at the end of her tether when Ivy approached her, not wanting to be left behind, followed willingly and did not challenge Snow Queen as Ivy snapped her into place.
Then the rest of the dogs: King, a solid white male, beside Shadow. King was the biggest of the males, the strongest so naturally bossed his brothers around when he had the chance. Red, a solid red male, was a friendly clown. He raised a paw and set it on Pepper’s shoulder in a friendly manner when he was placed beside him.
Pepper responded by licking the other’s face. Pepper was a handsome male with a solid black body, white blaze on his face and down his nose and two white front feet. These were the two wheel dogs. The wheel dogs were always harnessed closest to the sled. They had a special job to do and this was to bear the brunt of the load, to keep it balanced and to start the load when the team set out. Just looking at the five dogs, a novice would simply think that this was a team of dogs all ready and eager to get started. But each pair of dogs had its own job; like the two wheel dogs, then the two swing dogs behind the leader. These swing dogs helped the leader turn the rest of the dogs in whatever direction the handler wanted them to go. Of course there was the lead dog. Some teams used double leaders. This meant two dogs harnessed side by side and fastened together with the neck line from one lead dog’s collar to the collar of the second lead dog to keep them going in the same direction, at the head of the team, taking directions from the handler. Ivy used a single leader- Snow Queen.
A conditioned dog team is like a well-oiled machine; watching an eager team is like watching poetry in motion
All the dogs stood harnessed now. All quivered with eagerness to get started. Nathan stood ready by the snub line to untie it once Ivy was in position and ready to start.
“Don’t feel too bad,” Nathan said. “About Dad selling the team, I mean. After all, you can’t take them with you and his job calls him to a different location.”
Ivy didn’t answer immediately. There was a moment of strained silence between Ivy and her youngest brother. Finally she said.
“Okay. I’m ready to start.”
Nathan swiftly undid the rope fastened to a post pounded deep in the ground to secure the rope to keep the team from starting off before the driver was ready.
“Hike,” Ivy sang out and her team was off.
“Hurry back,” Nathan urged. “Black clouds on the horizon. A bad storm is brewing. You would be smart to get back before the storm breaks.

But Ivy didn’t hear. The dogs eager feet pounding on the hard baked earth of the trail and the noise the cart made drowned out all other sounds.
The dog yard had been shady, but the instant they were away, Ivy and her team moved swiftly along on a long section of gravel road where the sun, already high in the sky, blazed down.
Ivy came to where the road she was on joined up with a newer, paved road or as the locals called it, Highway 106, that led into town only eight miles away.
“Whoa,” she said to the dogs and applied the brakes. She checked for traffic in both directions. When she saw none, she cried out. “Okay, Snow Queen.”
The huge, grey and white lead dog, followed by her four team mates, leapt forward and were across the highway in seconds. Soon they were out of the blazing sun and traveling on an old logging camp access road. The trail wound along through tall, thick stands of evergreen trees, poplar and Birch. Ivy welcomed the shade of the tall trees.
Ivy much preferred winter mushing. Snow cushioned the trails, providing much smoother ride and running for the dogs. The only sounds to be heard were the dogs’ breathing, their feet on the trail and the swoosh of the sled runners gliding over snow. Ivy loved snow. She loved the perfect picture of untouched whiteness after a gentle snow flurry; she found peace in the gently falling snowflakes or even as a blizzard raged around her. She loved the colours the late afternoon shadows created on the snow; the pinks, blues, white, green. How could there be anything more beautiful on earth?


Ivy’s mind went back to the January day, three years ago, that Snow Queen and her littermates had been born. Snow Queen had been the biggest and strongest from the start. She was big for a female, outweighing and taller than even the males in the team. The grey patch on her back blended in with the silver colour of the rest of her made her stand out as a puppy and she still stood out from the rest of her brothers and sister. Before Ivy knew it, they had descended into a valley where a river flowed through at the bottom of the valley. At a spot where the water didn’t run very deep, to the dogs’ shoulders, maybe, the trail crossed over to the other bank. Of course in the winter when logging trucks used this road, this crossing spot would be frozen solid, ice and snow proving a safe crossing for heavily loaded logging trucks.
All five dogs gulped down huge swallows of the cool, clear water as they waded through. Ivy saw lots of wildlife. She noticed an eagle high in a tree, scanning for a possible meal; or it could have been the mate of a second eagle staying out of sight on a nest.
Maybe he was keeping an eye on her, Ivy thought making sure she wasn’t out to harm his family. She caught sight of a bear fishing for a meal in the river. He was far enough away not to be a threat to her.
Then she heard the rumble of thunder. Looking up she noticed dark clouds beginning to show above the trees on the ridge top above her. Rain clouds- and lots more roiling back clouds hidden behind the trees Ivy couldn’t see. Coming to a loop, Ivy called out.
“Gee, Snow Queen.”
Snow Queen turned to the right and kept going until the loop joined the main road.
Another rumble of thunder: Ivy looked up again. Soon thunder rolled again and she counted until she saw the lightning.
The storm is almost upon us she thought. But if I push the team we can stay ahead of the rain.
“Pick it up, Snow Queen,” she sang out urgently.
Snow Queen leaned forward against the tugline. The five dogs picked up speed. Ivy knew it wasn’t just the urgency in her tone that prompted the dog to speed forward. She knew The Queen didn’t like thunder; the loud noise hurt her sensitive hearing. The further she could get away from the ahead and away from the noise, the better she liked it.
“Hurry, Snow Queen,” Ivy urged. “We must stay ahead of the rain. This clay trail may be parched hard and easy to travel over now but it turns into a slippery, sticky quagmire when rain hits it. We don’t want to be stuck here.”






































In The Path of A Tornado




By now they had climbed the slope on the other side and she could see around better. What she saw frightened her. To her the clouds didn’t appear normal. Huge fluffy clouds were, that in a normal thunder or rainstorm would have been a solid mass across the sky, now scuttled individually across the sky. The sky itself had a milky hue to it. She didn’t know what to make of it. She urged her team onto super dog strength.
To Ivy the road home seemed longer. At last they came to where they had to cross the highway. Ivy stopped the team, as usual, to make sure it was safe to continue. That’s when the rain caught up with them. It happened so suddenly Ivy could do nothing to prevent it.
One second Ivy could clearly then the next the rain came down in front of her in torrents. In minutes her long black hair was soaked and raindrops dripped down her forehead and into her eyes.
“Hike,” Ivy commanded, not hearing any traffic. One instant Ivy could see clearly and the next wind blew fiercely and the rain came down all around her in torrents. Ivy knew immediately this was not an ordinary thunderstorm. Safely across, Snow Queen started the unit up the long road towards home. To their left, Ivy heard the wind- it sounded like an approaching freight train. Its force ripped up trees by the roots and flung them back down to earth. So far the tornado’s path was a narrow swath moving parallel with her and the team. Would it cross her path before she arrived home?
“Faster,” Ivy sang out to the team but the wind whipped away her words. Snow Queen didn’t need urging. Ivy noticed The Queen moved forward at super dog speed. Then below the small incline in the road only yards away from home the wind increased in ferociousness. The tornado veered slightly and headed straight for road. Ivy and the team were right in its path. She couldn’t do anything about it. She heard ripping sounds and then the top part of a tall, thick Spruce tree broke loose from the rest of the trunk and toppled onto the road right on top of Snow Queen. Ivy winced as Snow Queen screamed in pain. Ivy screamed right along with her. And then just as sudden as it came upon them, the storm passed on, the sky cleared and the sun shone from a clear sky.

Ivy jumped from the cart seat and ran to the front of the line of dogs. The Queen lay pinned beneath the heavy treetop. Ivy covered her face with her hands and screamed again when she saw blood running down Snow Queen’s neck.
The next thing she knew she was in her father’s arm. He embraced her, drew her close and held her tight. She buried her face in the soft cloth of her father’s shirt. Her face was as gray as the rocks showing through the ground’s surface all around.
“We heard one of the dogs kyiing in pain, then you screamed, twice,” Mr. Herman explained. “That brought us out here on the run.”
Ivy looked around to see her mother and brothers nearby. Mrs. Herman went to Ivy and embraced.
“Thank God it isn’t you pinned under that tree.”
”We can thank God this happened close to home, otherwise it might have taken a long time to find you and the story might have ended differently.”
“Is she dead?” Ivy glanced at her dog lying in the slippery mud the rain had created, so still and her eyes closed. The boys stood up after examining Snow Queen and turned to Ivy.
Nathan shook his head
“She’s still breathing,” Josiah said.
He studied where the storm had traveled. Apparently it had come straight from the north, intersecting Ivy’s path in this precise spot. Numerous trees lay uprooted or their tops broken off in a narrow swath to the north and to the south. He could see the path of destruction it made through the trees to the lake and continued on the far shore.
“What was it, Dad?” Ivy asked. “I never experienced anything like it.”
“From all appearances, you got in the way of a tornado,” Mr. Herman replied. “Thank God nither you or the dogs weren’t hurt worse. Tornados have been known to pick objects up and set them down again miles away.”
“Tornado? Here?” Josiah said.
“Never heard of Tornados this far north,” Nathan said. “Or anywhere in Canada.”
“But listen to the news and that is changing,” Mr. Herman said. “Tornados are getting to be common in the southern parts of the Prairie Provinces where it’s constantly hot; the hot humid weather we’ve had the past week or so is exactly the kind of conditions that spawns tornados.”
“I hope no one else was hurt, or homes destroyed,” Mrs. Herman said.
“Let’s get her out from under that tree and home,” Mr. Herman said to Ivy’s brothers. “Josiah, I need you to bring the chainsaw. The tree will have to be removed so the vet can get to our place.”
“Okay, Dad,” Josiah sent off towards the house.
“I’ll phone the vet to come and look at Snow Queen,” Mrs. Herman offered. “Ivy, come with me to the house. You look shaken.’
“Your face is gray,” Josiah said.
“Yeah, as gray as the rocks around us,” Nathan teased.
“Shut up, Nathan,” Ivy snapped. “I’ve put up with enough of your lack of respect.”
Nathan was taken aback at his sister’s burst of temper but fell quiet.
“Your Dad and the boys will look after the dogs,”
Mrs. Herman urged.

























An Outstanding ‘Forever Home’.



For Sale: A Dog team




Ivy sat in a comfortable easy chair in the living-room when her father returned with Snow Queen limp in his arms. He sent the animal down on a rug in front of the stone fireplace. In the winter, on exceptionally cold nights, Mr. Herman, or one of the boys, lit a fire in the hearth and the house was always extra warm no matter what kind of frigid weather came their way.
“Josiah and Nathan are looking after the other dogs,” Mr. Herman said
“The vet will be here shortly,” Mrs. Herman said.
At that moment a vehicle pulled up outside. Soon the vet was out of his jeep, and after Josiah or Nathan directed him that way, hurried towards the house. Mr. Herman met him at the door and led him to The Queen. She hadn’t stirred.
“Hummmmmmm, not too bad,” he reported.
“Will she live?” Ivy asked anxiously.
The vet ran practiced fingers over Snow Queen’s huge form. “I can’t find any broken bones; just the wound on her neck. The tree branch merely broke the skin, no real damage done. I’ll stitch up the torn skin and she will be as right as rain in a couple of days.”
There was a collective sigh of relief from the family.
The vet continued. “You did right in calling me, otherwise the wound would have gotten infected.”
“That will do it.” The vet said as he snipped the thread of the last stitch. “See that she takes it easy for the next few days. I’ll be back in a week to check her over again.”

A few days later, Ivy brought The Queen some food. The dog was awake and doing well; she ate the food and drank the water Ivy brought her.
“Ivy, this would be a good time to check out the Winschell website.”
“Coming, Dad,” Ivy answered.
She and Snow Queen scrambled to their feet and followed Mr. Herman. He already had the desired website on the screen. Ivy pulled up a chair and set it down beside her father. Silently, Ivy studied the screen.
“They call their outfit Sun Dog Kennels’,” she said.
She fell silent again, studying the websites contents. What she saw was a pleasant, dark-haired man in his mid-thirties smiling back at her, welcoming her to the website of Sun Dog Kennels. With a click of the mouse, Mr. Herman moved to other pictures. Photos of a good looking, laughing youth of about fifteen with some handsome Alaskan Malamutes and another close-up picture of him and a black and white
dog.
“That must be the son, Owen Jr,” Ivy said and her father nodded. More pictures of either him or his father driving a team through snowy, scenic country. Suddenly, it dawned on her the Winschells might not live in Northern Saskatchewan.
“Where does Owen Winschell live?”
“Just outside of Forest Lake to the east in Northern Ontario,” Mr. Winschell explained.
“Wow,” Ivy breathed. “That’s a long way to ship five dogs; across two entire provinces.”
“We won’t have to ship them, “ Mr. Herman explained. “Owen SR. says they can pick the dogs up in their rig.”
Ivy leaned forward, elbows on the desk, and studied this interesting father/son combination further. They were back at the kennel. Ivy noticed the inside of the kennel building where the mothers whelped and nursed their litters, was nicely divided into pens with chainlink fencing and the facilities were clean both inside and out. Mr. Winschell and his son treated their dogs with great respect and in return the dogs were smiling, happy animals, willing to obey. All in all the pictures portrayed the two loving animals, mushing and racing their teams. A few of the pictures even showed young Owen with his team and the trophies they’d won. Ivy decided she wouldn’t mind sending Snow Queen and her sisters and brother to this kennel at all.
I asked you to provide a good home for the five dogs, Ivy said to herself and to God. And you have. I couldn’t have done any better on my own. Thank you.
She swallowed. What she said next was the hardest thing she had ever had to say.
“You can sell my dogs to the Winschells, Dad.”
Mr. Herman looked at her, concerned.
“Are you certain? We don’t want them to go some where they will abuse them.”
“I don’t think they will be abused by these people,” Ivy argued firmly. “There aren’t two people I’d rather see them go to. I talked to God about this a lot and I believe these are the people he wants the dogs to live with.”
“All right. I’ll email Owen Winschell Sr. and let him know we are willing to sell,” Mr. Herman agreed.
“It’s such a neat little package, Ivy. Your team have lived their lives together; all five from the same litter. I’m glad they won’t have to be separated.”
“Me too, Dad,” Ivy agreed. She stroked Snow Queen between the ears.

Like promised, the vet did visit the Herman family a week after Snow Queen had been hurt. He was all smiles as he examined the dog.
“She’s healed wonderfully,” he said happily. “She won’t miss any exercise runs or races this winter.”
“She won’t be running any races with us,” Ivy said.
“I hear your father has been transferred,” the vet said.
“That’s right,” Mr. Herman said.
“We were waiting to move once we sold all the dogs,” Ivy pointed out. “They are now all sold, now we can move and get settled in our new home before school starts.”
Now that she was convinced her chums were going to an extraordinary good owners, her enthusiasm for moving had no bounds.
The vet looked around him.
“What will you do with this place? It’s a nice spot.”
“The property is up for sale,” Mr. Herman answered.
“Good, then I will buy it,” the vet declared. “I’ve looked for a good spot out of town to set up for a long time. This place will fill the bill nicely. My wife and family have wanted to live in the country for a long time. They’ll love this; we’ll get the kids some dogs, maybe even some horses and other animals.”
“Sold,” Mr. Herman told the eager young man.
Ivy knelt and took The Queen’s great head in her hands. Snow Queen licked her face.
”That was truly our last run together,” she said. “I will have great memories of our last run to take with me. Those memories will be with me forever-the wildlife, the smell of wood-smoke in the cold winter air, sitting in the living-room, wrapped in the warmth from the fireplace; swimming in the summer, picking berries. You will always be in my thoughts, Snow Queen.”