Wine Journaling

We opened a Bogle Merlot the other day.  I had mentioned to Aaron a Bogle wine I remembered having over a year ago that I liked so much, but couldn't recall what varietal.  It was a wine that has stuck in my head since then.  When I went to look for a few months ago, all I could find at the store was the Bogle Petit Sirah, and after trying that, I knew that wasn't quite it.  So we opened the Bogle Merlot the other night and, although it was good, it wasn't at all like the wine I remembered liking so much.

It finally occured to me to look in my wine journal, which I was much better at keeping a year ago than I am today.  I wondered if I had been smart enough to write down this mystery Bogle wine that I liked so much so that I would remember down the road. 

Phew...sure enough, I was!  Good job, 2008 Ashley!  I pulled out my wine journal, which I started keeping very loosely in 2006. 

And I flipped through the pages until I found this page below.  Yes!  I was so smart...I even kept the label from the Bogle bottle and pasted it in the book along with notes from the night we drank it!

Bogle Phantom 2005, a blend of 

Petit Sirah, Old Vine Zinfandel and Old Vine Mourvedre

In my notes I wrote that we drank it when we had my sister and brother in-law over for dinner on December 28th, 2008.  We drank it with our chicken stir-fry, which is a Schram specialty.  It was a very complex and full-bodied wine, with lots of flavors from each of the three different grapes blended together.  It was oh, so good!  And if my memory serves me correctly, this was shortly after I got over some nasty flu, so it only took a glass for me to be feeling pretty good.  No wonder I liked it so much!  Adding to its appeal was the fact that we drank it with good company.  Since my sister has six children, a dinner with just the four of us is extremely unusual.  The ambiance in which we drank it came into play.

I also found in my wine journal, notes on my introduction to wine making that Aaron set me up with a few years ago.  We made a Sangiovese from a kit.  It was my first wine making experience and Aaron said it was important to take careful notes, which are quite humorous as I read them now...

And I also found some cards in there from the 2007 Wine Expo we went to early in our dating relationship.  I picked up the "cards" of the wines I really liked and put them in here. 

After reading through several notes in my white wine section, it was in here that I documented in late 2006, a Chardonney that I actually liked.  Chardonney is normally too buttery for me and is usually my last pick on white wine list, so I am glad that I noted one that struck my fancy in here.  I wonder if I will like it just as much if I try it again today?

It is my new goal to keep up with my wine journal this year.  With the amount of wine we drink, this is something that should be easy for me to track...quite frequently.  Now that I've rediscovered all this valuable information, I now have a wine shopping list.  We'll see if these wines I liked a few years ago have withstood the test of time.

And if you don't already, I encourage you to keep a wine journal too.  What do you like?  Has your palette developed over the years? 

Being Resourceful with Grapevines

This weekend we pruned grapevines.  Aaron kindly reminded me that I did not help with this task last winter...only in the summer did I help.  Can you blame me?  But, I came around this year and we took advantage of the sunshine and the temps above freezing to get the grapevines ready for spring budbreak.  It was so nice out this weekend, we actually contemplated having a picnic outside in the snow.  Only Minnesotans would consider that in 34 degree weather. 

Winter is far from over, but once the vines come out of dormancy, they'll grow like crazy.  Pruning was a hard thing for me to wrap my head around because we basically took all the excess vines that grew last summer and chopped them all off.  I thought it would just be a snip here and a snip there, but it felt more like a butcher.  8 feet of out of control grapevines and shoots---Gone.  I know, seems counterproductive, but trust me, it's what we are supposed to do. 

Now they are nice and trimmed up and in a trellis system so they are much better prepared for spring.  No more excess growth that would otherwise use up energy and prevent grapes from developing and riping.

For some reason, "Welcome to the Jungle" plays through my head when I look at this picture.  You can't tell where one grapevine starts and the other begins.

So we cut off all that excess growth and on some vines, used this "Scott Henry" system.

And on the others, used the traditional "Vertical Shoot Positioning" (VSP) system.

Ahhh...they look so much better.  It's like getting a good haircut.

What did I do with the piles and piles of trimmed off grapevines?

I made grapevine wreaths!

I love when I can be resourceful like that!

Mutts

Growing up, we had a dog named Glory.  She was a mutt.  She came into our family before I was born, so my memories of her are from when she was very old.  We had to put her to sleep right before my 13th birthday, after battling cancer and an abnormally large tumor under her front leg.  I think she was 14, and for a medium sized dog, that's a pretty good life.  Glory was an odd dog.  She pushed big rocks around with her nose, barked at them, carried them around in her mouth, and buried them.  As a result she had a very flat nose.  Here is a picture of me and Glory, right after she had been, um, playing with rocks.  

Glory was a true mutt:  Matted hair, disporportionate body, hair growing over her eyes, odd behaviors.  Have you ever heard of a dog that was bred to hunt rocks?  What kind of trait is that?  I can only think that was a result of some cross-breeding gone awry.  But we loved her.  She was sweet, albeit weird.

I've been referring to our puppies as "Great Dane" for a while now.  We adopted them in July when they were about 4 months old, so we believe they are coming up on one year.  I'm not sure what I was smoking the day I agreed to bring home, what we were then told could possibly be two purebred Great Danes with potential to grow to 150lbs each.  But I'm glad we did.  Since these dogs were found roaming, nobody really knew where they came from, but Great Dane was one breed they felt certain about.  I love them to death, but am increasingly grateful that, so far, they have not grown to a full Dane size. Knock on wood.  Leading us to believe that they are likely mixed with something or several other things, which is hard to tell since even the two of them differ in size and coloring.  I think we have two mutts on our hands.  Handsome mutts, but mutts nonetheless. 

They are striking dogs, especially together with their opposite coloring. She's the yin to his yang.  

We've had several people weight in on what type of mix Tux and Belle might be based on looks and behavior.  Boxer...Pointer...Spaniel...Mastiff...Horse...Pony... 

One guy pulled his car over on the road one day when I was walking them to ask me if Tux was a "Swiss."  I think of a Swiss Mountain dog as intelligent and regal. 

I pointed at Tux and responded, "You mean this doofus?"  The hundred pound dog who stands at the top of the stairs and whines because he is scared to go in the basement by himself?  The dog the size of ME who tries to crawl in my lap without my noticing?  I swear Tux whistles non-chalantly avoiding eye contact with me while he plops his big clumsy paws up on my legs and inches his entire body up in my lap while I'm sitting on the couch.  If it is possible to be non-chalant and clumsy at the same time, Tux has mastered it. Maybe that's a traits of Swiss Mountain dogs and I just don't know it. 

And then there was the day the three neighbor girls knocked on our door to ask if they could ride our horse.
Kidding.  That didn't happen. But they do frequently ask if they can walk the dogs. And we let them.  Reluctantly.  And cross our fingers the girls don't return covered in dust and scrapes from being dragged on the gravel road for a half a mile.  So far, so good.

We were told these dogs would grow until they are about two years old.  But for the past several months they're growth has been fairly stagnant  Although I think Tux may surpass me in weight very soon.  We don't have a scale in our house, so this theory was tested by Aaron picking us both up and determining that I still have him by a few pounds.  But then Tux and I had an arm wrestling match. He won.  We thought about getting a harness and hanging them from the scale in the chicken coop that we use to weigh grapes.  That image in my head makes me giggle. 

Whatever these strikingly beautiful, completely goofy, giant lap dog, mystery mutts...who cares?  We love 'em.

Hey, watcha doin'? Blogging?

Sniffing me to try and distract me from the fact that he's really trying to get in my lap.

And a little closer...

This was the closest I got before he was in my lap and my lens doesn't get THAT close. 

Inhaling Paint Fumes, Building Wine Racks

If the following post sounds a little off, it's only because I've spent the last two hours in an enclosed plastic wrapped area in our basement staining the wine racks we're building and I may be slightly high on paint fumes.  I didn't realize it until I finished and felt a little light headed.  I had to go outside for some fresh air and it was the first time this week being outside actually felt GOOD.

Anyway, spending two hours by myself painting wood and inhaling paint fumes gave me time to hallucinate. 
I mean think.  It gave me time to think.  It made me think as I was carefully painting every square inch of our wine rack, that as proud as I am of the wood veneer I ironed on all the edges and cleaned up with a razor blade, my "woodworking" pales in comparison to Aaron's Uncle Don.  Don is a retired carpenter who has found an amazing skill and hobby in woodworking.  While I don't have pictures of all of his work, I do have one that I will post here. 

Our homebuilt wine racks are made from plywood and are designed to hold mass quanitites of wine.  Recall all those carboys of wine we have in our basement? Those will all be getting bottled and we'll need a place to store them. 

Don, however, designed and built a simply amazing, quality craftmanship boutique wine rack for us as a wedding gift.  And this lovely piece is definitely worthy of a shout out.  I'm not sure how many hours he spent whittling away at this, but I can imagine it was quite time consuming.  It is definitely one of the most thoughtful gifts Aaron or I have ever received. 

All the details are what makes this so special.  The grapes at the top are actually cut from a piece of wood called purple heart that turns that purple color naturally when it is cut.  Which makes me glad to know that Don was not inhaling paint fumes when he made this.  All of these pieces were cut individually from different types of wood and placed together like a puzzle in order to give it its round shape. 

And look, it even has our names on it!

Thanks, Don! 

We still have some more staining to do on our silly little wine racks before they are complete.  Then organizing the rest of that messy room.  I'll post pictures of the wine cellar once it is all complete, well mostly.

All Bad Weeks Must Come to an End

This week wasn't a fun week for me.  Not sure why, but it might've had something to do with the fact that I started my week by spinning off the road on my way to work on Monday morning.  I "180ed" right into a snowbank and even 4-wheel drive couldn't get me out.  And it was 17 below zero according to my car.  And it was on that darn gravel road which is now just a blanket of ice, and apparently hadn't been salted very well.  Luckily I was only a half mile from our house.  Luckily Aaron hadn't left for work yet and was still home.  Unluckily, the Hummer he built currently has a dead battery so we couldn't use that to pull me out.  Have I posted about the homebuilt Hummer yet?  I will. 

I called Aaron at 7:02am about 3 minutes after I left the house. "Hi Honey. I spun off the road and I'm stuck."

To which he responded with a sigh, "Again?"

Not, "Are you okay?"  But, "Again?"  Isn't he a sweetheart? 

Okay, so maybe this happened last year too.  On the same gravel road.  I'm learning. 

Aaron showed up with some shovels and my Uggs and the two of us started shoveling the Jeep out.  Until moments later a good samaritan neighbor stopped.  Ironically, this was the same neighbor Aaron inadvertantly spilled beer on the first time he met him so we were glad he wasn't still holding a grudge.  He had seen me in the snowbank on his way to work in his sedan and had turned around to go home and get his pick-up truck and some rope.  Gotta love those country neighbors! 
So we dropped him off a bottle of our Marquette that night.

 

See how this works?  Our limited supply of Marquette is in high demand.  Since we aren't selling it yet, you just have to do something really nice for us and maybe you'll get a taste.  Like pull me out of a ditch at 7am when it is 17 below zero.  So give me your number and I'll call you next time. 

OR, perhaps come help out at the Schram Vineyards Planting Party this May when we'll have 1300 more vines to plant.  More details to follow on that!

The rest of the week was filled with little surprises, like finding frozen condensation all over the brand new windows we installed in November.  

Which we learned has nothing to do with the windows, but rather the traces of humidity in our house that inevitably cause condensation to freeze in these sub zero temperatures. 

And the renter at my uptown condo (the one I owned when I met Aaron) called to tell me the heat went out.   One of the pleasures of being a landlord. 

Do you see a common theme in my bad week?  Really sucky things that happen in really cold weather.  I'm ready for the 30s they are predicting next week.  And I'm looking forward to a few days in Dallas for work the following week.  Even though I hear they are getting cold whether too.  Although 22 degrees to a Texan is equivalent to -22 for a Minnesotan.   

But despite being a bad week, Aaron is good about putting things in perspective and reminding me of our good life. 

He might walk in the house with his big wet boots and track water all over our hardwood floors. 

And he may try to cook rice in an omelet pan. 

And he may not know how to load a dishwasher. 

I am still working on housetraining this gentleman farmer.  I'll get there.  Just like he is teaching me how to be a farmer.  And how to drive more carefully in icy gravel roads. 

But he does know how to cheer me up.  Who doesn't smile coming home on a cold Friday afternoon after a bad week to their three best friends (Aaron not pictured) eagerly awaiting for them to get home?

 And three vibrant bouquets of flowers sitting on the kitchen table just for me? One from each of the three creatures that are living here with me. I love them.

Flowers and Puppies make things all better.   

The Wine Bottle Chandelier

Every month I get the Pottery Barn catalogue.  I love everything in there.  Everything.  Love it.
Now that our house is pretty much finally settled with furniture and decor, I've been able to resist the temptation to buy anything, so I just look at it every month for ideas, design, paint, organization, and furniture for the next time I get the bug to change things up a bit. 

The past several months, one particular item has been tantalizing me.  A wine bottle chandelier.  But I have shied away from the price.  Four hundred bucks.  And the fact that we don't really need a new chandelier. But I just think this is so cool, and we're wine people...so we should have a wine bottle chandelier, right?

I showed Aaron this picture in the PB catalogue, and before I knew it, he was pulling out supplies for us to make one ourselves.  I mean, look at the main materials here...a bunch of wine bottles, which, hello? we have like hundreds of around here!  We thought this would be fun in our soon-to-be wine cellar, another project we are just getting started on in the basement.  Here is a "before" picture.  And this was even after I had already moved out a bunch of junk!

Can't you just visualize the potential in this mess of a room?!  Think swanky...dark walls with mood lighting, and wine bottles floor to ceiling in rustic wine racks. Can you see it? 

But, back to the chandelier.  We went to the whiteboard and came up with our own wine bottle chandelier design, making ours rectangular and adding in some wine glass holders, and found 8 matchng bottles from our collection of recycled bottles, brought out the drill, the tape measure, bought some thingies for wiring it, cut some plywood, slapped on some stain, and the result was this...

And in case you are wondering, we painted the room too.  Merlot Red.  The paint name only had a slight influence on our choosing the color.  It was between that and Moroccan Spice and when we couldn't decide, Merlot Red won out, even though neither of us think it is really "Merlot" in color.  But we like how it turned out.  Now, to finish getting the rest of the room set-up.  Here is a sneak peak of the next project in transforming this room into a swanky wine cellar. 

The wine racks, which are, sort of an essential part to a wine cellar.  So far my only contribution to this project has been helping to carry in the 8 huge and heavy planks of plywood.  Really heavy.  Pretty soon, I'll hear Aaron calling...I enter back in once it is constructed for sanding and staining.