I’m too excited not to share here, even though this has nothing to do with babies. My husband was in the wine business years ago and now he is a just hobbyist winemaker. We crushed a Napa Carneros Cabernet Sauvignon back in October 2013. The day he brought a trailer full of grapes to our driveway was an eventful day. He has a business trip planned, and had just hours to crush 1 ton of grapes in our driveway, while I was at the studio shooting a newborn session. He finished the crush, into a very large macro bin in the garage, and left the mess on the driveway for me to clean up. It’s ok honey, I forgive you! The kids and I spent the next week checking the grapes twice a day and “punching down the cap”, or the dry grapes that make their way to the top of the bin during the fermentation process. We added the yeast a few days into the process, and checked on them religiously those first few weeks. Today, after 14 months on French oak in our garage, the wine went into bottles today. It has been a family affair, and will result in about 25 cases of a beautiful wine. We still need to order the final labels, and put a silver foil on the bottle, but we’re almost done! I will create a blog post once all of that is done, but I had to share what we’ve done so far. I created the artwork for the label and we’re getting them printed this week.
A few of these pictures show some vintage barrel staves from original barrels that my husband’s Great Grandfather coopered. We still have them, what a treasure.
Its been very rewarding and fun. And it tastes amazing too. We’re looking forward to our 2015 vintage starting in the Fall. No babies today – Secondo Vento (Second Wind in Italian – husband’s heritage).
