Karen, the hair stylist!

Shortly before Christmas, Joey and I took a weekend adventure to San Francisco. When you live in Napa and you say "I'm going to The City" that means you're going to SanFran. When you live in NY and you say "I'm going to The City" you mean, of course, that you're going to Manhattan. So even after a year of being a west-coaster I still think we're going to Manhattan when we're going to The City. You can imagine my shock when we don't end up in Grand Central!! It never gets old.

Even though there haven't been any major earthquakes in a while, you can still find cracks in SanFran...

We stayed with our friends from C'ville (who have also just recently transplanted) in their wonderful apartment in The City. Nicole (her hubby was out of town) was a surpurb host and made sure that we treked over all the hills in her neighborhood so that we could get the entire SanFran experience. We went to Coit Tower (just up the hill from their apartment), a little thai restaurant (there's not good thai food where we live in Napa), and got our eyebrows touched up (well, Joey didn't, but Nicole and I did).

Coit Tower and the view from said tower.

Joey and I stood in front of The pointy building of SanFran. I can't remember what it was called but i think it's famous. To the right of the pointy building is Copolas famous restaurant... it's green.

Here's the pointy building from close up.

Later that evening Nicole went to her dress-up Holiday party (Joey and I went to a dress-down holiday party so there are no photos of us dressed fancy). And a strange thing happened... Nicole and I had girly time and I actually DID her hair up pretty. I've never done anything pretty to my hair, nevermind anyone elses hair so this was kind of a big deal for me!!! So here's Nicole dressed up....

And here's a close up of her hair...(I even clipped in the produce... i mean, foliage)

After our respective holiday parties, we met up at a local brew pub where they had old school sewing machine tables for their pub tables (complete with the manual foot pump). Random, but fun.

Thanksgiving Extravaganza 2007

[Insert Karen's voice here.]

My parents and Joey's brother, Jeremy, came to visit for Thanksgiving this year. It was great to have visitors to our new digs.

This is us at Robert Sinsky Winery. My favorite thing to do is set the timer on my camera and then run really fast to get into the photo in time. This time I put it on a super pretty red car. I'm sure the owners of the car would have been pissed if I scratched it, but ...pheww.. my camera is like a soft cloud upon nice paint jobs!

After Jeremy flew away on the plane, my folks and KaJo visited the petrified forest. That's where some folks dug up some trees that had turned to stone after the eruption of Mt. St. Helena. Something about the ash settling in to where the tree cells used to be... so the cells are replaced with silica and the form is preserved. So the folks dug up these trees and now charge money (six smackers) for people/suckers (like us) to see the tree/rocks. Not a bad way to make a buck (or six).

Below... mom and dad with a tree/rock.

Outside the gift store at the petrified forest, dad and I had a chance to pose/blend in with the wildlife in the Napa Valley.

Next, we headed over to the Old Faithful geyser. This part of California was popular for it's hot springs and mud baths back in the day. The whole area has underground springs which flow over hot magma and then erupt (the water, not the magma) out of holes in the ground. The geyser goes for about a minute (maybe 2) and then rests for about 30 minutes before it erupts again. If the eruptions are not regular, then sometimes that can be a sign of an earthquake in the area over the next few days. (as a note, there are earthquakes here quite frequently, but we usually don't notice because they're so small. But if you spend your days sitting down at a desk, then you have a better chance of feeling them. I haven't felt one yet.) The Old Faithful geyser is privately owned and charges people/suckers (does this sound familiar) $8 ($7 for AAA members) to see the 2 minute eruption.

The eruption.

Mom and Dad like the eruption... see how they smile!!There's a small 'zoo' at the geyser (aka, a fence with some goats in it). Dad got to work on his animal skills (aka, scratching animal bums) and tried to teach a little boy all about animals.

Lastly, we went to the Bale Grist Mill. This is a state operated original mill that still makes flour and polenta on the weekends with two-ton grinding wheels from France. Our tour guide was the miller and he was super cool. The mill proved to be the highlight of our tourist destinations that were not wine related. They charged us $2 for a truly educational and interactive tour that was awesome. Here's a photo of the mill wheel.

As far as wineries go, we visited Clos Pegase (of course) where mom went back for seconds of the port wine that we make (and then I think she drank my taste of it, too!); we stopped at Grigch Hills Estate Winery for our tasting of their biodynamic wines and mom and dad had the chance to learn about biodynamic agriculture; and then we finished at Robert Sinsky Winery where they had tiny nibbles to eat with the wines. The nibbles were a good idea at this point since I think my mom needed some food to soak up the giggles!

Here's mom saddling up to the wine bar at Grigch!

Beer Making, meet Joey.

Karen again.

We're a bit backlogged with photos. Joey really wanted me to post some photos of his beer making adventure. The beer's been ready to drink for the last few weeks and it's actually pretty good. It's a Strong Irish Red Ale. It has creamy bubbles, lovely red color, and tastes yummy.

This is Joey with the entire kit on Christmas day.

So in January we soaked the barley...

We boiled the wort....

And we tucked the carboy of fermenting beer in the closet with the space heater for about 2 months (the instructions said it would only take 2 WEEKS, but I guess it was still cold, even with the space heater..and the blankets).

We don't have any photos of the bottling, but rest assured, it's all in bottles now and it is tasted on the weekends and during basketball games!

Bustin' out with the vineyards!

Karen here.

I'll have to admit that I'm an obsessive blog reader. I check in on my friends daily and get really excited for them. But I spend so much time checking in with my friends that I run out of time to post to my own blog. So here I am. Posting.

The past few weeks in the Napa Valley have been warm and sunny, and the vines are just beginning to bust out of their winter hibernation. I've been going into the vineyards more as a part of my integration into the Viticulture Coordinator (sounds official, huh?). Next year I'll be the full Viti Coordinator, but they're just easing me into it. Below is a photo of budbreak in our Cabernet Sauvignon. It's a super close up shot, so you have to imagine little tiny baby leaves. They're really no bigger than the first joint on my pinkie finger.

So when the new shoots grow a little bigger you can see the itty bitty grape cluster.... they look like tiny green cauliflowers. I've pointed to them in the following photo (it's not my actual hand, but you know what I mean)...

There are also some good looking flowers out right now...