Inspire Me.

A vintner's life for me

I spent today hand labeling bottles of Chardonnay Reserve and checking them for residue. The bottling machine came in on Monday and was very broken. Not only have we been unable to bottle, but I was the lucky First Colony employee to hand label the bottles that had gotten filled. In the process, I discovered that 11 cases of wine had little specks of residue floating in the bottles. This is not good for white wine, mind you! Nothing to change the taste, but aesthetically, no good. It was actually fun and the Kluge winemaker stopped by while I was checking the bottles and asked me if I was the new winemaker....sweet.

As for the tasting room shenanigans, there haven't been much. There was one drunk man at our festival a few weeks ago. He was entertaining and did not put up a fight when we refused to serve him.

Monday, however, a man came in to find out what happens during a tasting. He wanted to bring his wife to wineries in the area and thought we could help him learn the drill. So I was chatting with him a bit and found out that he was a pilot and had been in the Navy. The conversation went on about simulators (I knew a lot about that...wink...) and wine (which I pretended to know a lot about...). Then the man asked about the deer nets on our vines. I told him that deer love grapes so we have to keep them away. He said he was an avid hunter and asked me who hunts our deer. Before I could answer he said, "You know, I was in the Navy...saw a lot of combat- I guess I just have to keep killing something." my mind: (Errrr, did I just hear that?!? Ahhhhh) what I said: "he he he . "

cominghome and overhung.

This may have been the longest weekend of my life. We were up for 22 hours on Saturday and I'll still be catching up on sleep next Saturday!

Something in the air

We literally had children spontaneously crying today. Spontaneous tears in the middle of the day and no explanation. Seriously?Seriously?

One child was in need of an exorcism with his devilish screams and the other child was pitifully bawling and kept telling me she didn't know why,

Seriously.

...Every Thought's a Possibility

The return of Whiskey Sours and the Sea of Orange.

A boring football game making the Wahoo fans reconnect with what a boring season feels like. My dad and his fellow SPE alum told us Saturday that it finally feels like the Wahoos again. Go figure.

The Summer's Beginning to Give Up Her Fight...

Today was rainy and felt like Fall once the rain subsided. If my cats didn't push the screens out of the windows and escape, I would have aired out the whole place! (I've gotta figure out what to do about that. Suggestions?)

I love the Fall and it really makes me feel energized. I think we are so socialized into a school schedule as the summer is ending that feelings of Fall just make us excited. (Or, wait, is that just those of us who were always excited for school to start? I have to watch the inadvertent geek-alerts.)

Speaking of geek alerts, David and I were watching Family Guy the other day and there was a scene where little Ewok men steal the hubcaps from a car. It is completely random and we were laughing pretty hard. David said, "Is that those little Star Wars--" I interrupted, "Yes, haha, Ewoks!" To which David said, continuing to laugh raucously, "No, no they aren't Ewoks because they have hoods on. They are those little Difislhvbui guys from Planet Fisuibndjs." -- Awkward laugh from me as David slowly stepped out of the room (realizing he had revealed his Sci-Fi self) and adjusted his pocket protector. FANTASTIC.

But, back to Fall. This is the time of year that wineries are booming. The harvest in this region happens in these 2 weeks. Some wineries had their festivals last weekend, First Colony is having their's on Saturday. Seriously, though, it is the most wonderful time at the winery, watching the little French winemaker flit around checking grapes, testing juice, tasting the current vintages, etc. etc. I feel so lucky to have started now because I get to see so much of the process. The harvest and pressing and tanking of this current crop AND the bottling and boxing of the vintages aging now. I had little interest in wine before this. I mean, I enjoyed it with dinner, but did not understand how it all worked. In just 2 weeks, I have really learned the ins and outs of a winery and learned how to taste wine completely differently. It's awfully fun.

Come on down for a tasting. Call me first to make sure I am there AND make it a day because there are lots of wineries around to try.

First Day in the Star Room!

Today was the first day back at the Montessori School of Charlottesville. This meant a lot of firsts for me. First day at Cutler Lane meeting children and parents, first day in a primary classroom, first time giving lessons to children after the learnin', aaaaand so on.

I can confidently say it was a wonderful day. Debbie (my head teacher), told me the classroom was fussy today because all of the children were so eager to have lessons and try out all the work, but I had no expectations and I thought it was lovely.

About half of the children came today; a mix of the older returning students and new three year olds.

I felt incredibly awkward at first, not really understanding how things operated at Cutler Lane and trying to figure out just how to keep a child interested in my lessons.

I am madly in love with the Star Room children already and there are still 50% to come!