Our new family member (and my defense of poor blogging)

Sorry about the lack of posting the past 10 days. My life has been crazy-busy. We traveled, we have a new family member living with us permanently (see below), and my work was insane last week because it was the last week of the fiscal year (we met our goals!).

We went to Michael's sister's graduation in Evanston the weekend before last, which was really fun. We are very proud of Amy for graduating from Northwestern and it was great to spend time with Michael's family.

On our way home, Michael and I made a special pit stop near Green Bay, WI. Please say hello to Winnie, our newest family member!

Michael and I have been talking about getting a dog for over a year. We've tossed around a lot of ideas about what type of dog we should get - husky, lab, golden retreiver, Airedale. Michael wanted a hunting dog, but our tiny house is just not conducive to a hunting dog.

Winnie is a Welsh Terrier. I don't remember which one of us suggested a Welsh Terrier. Welshes look like mini-Airedales. Technically, Welshes were originally bred for hunting rodents but not so much anymore. Still, as a terrier, they are a feisty breed who love to play, sometimes a bit aggressively.

Winnie will grow to about 16 inches and will weigh around 20 pounds. I love her long legs and rectangular face. She's has hair, not fur, so she won't shed. My favorite feature on her is her coloring, though she will lose all of the black on her face. I just love the black and tan look of her now and am a bit sad she will lose it.

So far, she has been a great addition to our family. She's a great cuddler and has a sweet and fun personality.  She's very playful and loves to explore. She rarely whines or barks. She's very friendly with people and other dogs, hardly ever being afraid. She loves children.She loves the cabin and is particularly fond of eating grass :-)

At the same time, she is a handful. We have to pretty much watch her all the time if she's not in her kennel. Potty training was improving throughout the week and weekend, though today has already had it's fair-share of accidents. She wasn't eating much until yesterday, when she decided to eat all her food super fast and then act like she was starving later. She's learned how to dig and started some nice holes on the beach at the cabin last weekend. She's in a nippy/biting stage and only wants the things she can't have.

Still, I have no regrets about getting a dog. I'm looking forward to many, many years of having her as a member of our family. More pictures to come!

Honeymoon - last day in CA

Monday was our last day in CA and we made the most of it.

But before I launch into the last few pictures of our winery-hopping experience, I wanted to share some pics of our room. We loved our room in the barn at Farmhouse. It was quiet, private, and a great size for two people.

I think our favorite feature was the indoor/outdoor fireplace. It had a 3-hour timer so we would turn it on every night before we went to bed and whenever one of us woke up in the middle, we would turn it on again. I loved it!

And some of the property.

This is the barn we stayed in.

Spa 

Jasper

I have no idea why I'm standing that way. 

Smore pit.

Front of the property

Back to the wineries. The first place we went on Friday morning was Sonoma-Cutrer. We’ve had their wine several times (we had a 2005 on my birthday last year) and we enjoy it. They offered private tours as part of their winery experience so we made that reservation in advance. Well, on the day of our tour, Michael and I were the only people who had signed up for that time so we had a completely private tour with a man named Michael :=) So off on the golf cart we went, all over the vineyard. My Michael took lots of photos that day and here are some of my favorite. Some of the close ups are SOOOO good!

Sonoma-Cutrer is actually better known for its Chardonnays than its Pinots. Since the harvest had just ended (literally 8 days before our visit), tour-guide Michael had us try a bunch of grapes right off the vine. We learned a lot from tour-guide Michael about how they decide when to pick the grapes, the different ways they train the vines to grow, and much more. It was a really fun experience.

We ate some of these grapes. 

We got to see a lot of behind the scenes stuff too!

 After the tour, we settled in to try several Chardonnays and a Pinot. We bought a few bottles here.

Then we went to Thomas George Estates. One of Michael’s co-workers had suggested we check it out. There was a downpour when we arrived but we didn’t care. We dashed into the cave. Yes, I said cave. It was probably the coolest winery we visited. Unfrotuantely, due to the rain, we left the camera in the car. There was a bar set up in the cave and we chatted with our bartender, who said they had had a wedding in there the day before. I turned around and there was a giant king’s table where he said the dinner took place. I made Michael count the number of chairs but there were just 40 so that never would have worked for us so I didn’t feel that badly that we never considered coming out there for our wedding  Anyways, we tried several wines there and bought another few bottles. It stopped raining by the time we left and Michael wanted to visit one more place: Rochioli. We were told that they had a huge waiting list to get some of the best wines but we checked it out anyway. It was a disappointment. It looked like an art studio with a bar and there wasn’t anyone there when we arrived. Once the bartender actually came out, she let us try two wines “because that was all they had left” and asked us if we wanted to go on the 5-year wait list. Michael said sure so I guess we have that to look forward to in 2017...

Once we were done there, we headed out to drive back to Oakland to fly to Scottsdale. As were driving, we had a fun surprise. Our favorite wine is MacMurray Ranch Pinot Noir. That was the wine we served at our wedding (and is currently in our wine box waiting for our 1-year anniversary). I knew from research that they did not have an open vineyard or tasting room so we didn’t bother finding out where it was. But we were driving along when we saw the sign for the vineyard. So we stopped and I took a quick picture. Maybe someday they’ll open up and we can tell them how they inadvertently sponsored our wedding.

Then we headed back to Oakland to fly to AZ. Our flight got delayed so we had lots of time in the airport so we knocked out several episodes of Downton Abbey (seriously, if you haven’t watched this show, you should) and then it was off to Scottsdale. We grabbed some food once we made it to the house and then called it a day.

More on our time spent in AZ next week!