Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Spring is here in ernest

It's been a busy march... the spring release on march 4th was a huge success - thank you all that have ordered our wines!  (the rose will be out in a week or so! keep an eye out!)

Sorry I've been a bad blogger... but I will try to come back more often...

Around the farm things have been waking up... Brian and I have been re-focusing some energy slowly but surely on the farm - It's starting to feel a little more sane around here after the crazy construction year that was 2014 ... We are regaining a little peace which is so incredibly welcome. We have been planting trees and seeds and putting up houses for birds and bees and prepping ground for a summer garden...  It feels so good to be gently putting the farm pack together.  Brian has continued to work on the fence and I've been looking into getting a native plant hedgerow planted that will create home for our pollinators as well as birds : )  So far Brian has 6 Oregon white oaks in and the native plants are next. I've gotten some time with my boys who helped us do a bunch of spring harrowing and seeding ... again feels so good to spend some time healing our ground. The blossoms have come in full force which is always incredible with 15+ fruit trees just around the house it's a sea of blossoms right now! between that and the cacophony of frogs, incests flying and the elk enjoying the spring grass... this place is teeming with life... wild and domestic : )


  
gotta love spring blossoms

the honey bees are doing great with the warm spring we have had! 

jr. had his last day as a bull calf - he's now a little less of a man...

we are now home to several mason bee houses... we are hosting about 1500 mason bees this spring...  the more biodiversity the better! : )

We also got a new roof of the farm house... ! 


I never get tired of this view!


We added to more bird houses... I think this puts us around 10 or so : ) 

  
Me and the boys heading out to seed and harrow! 

Brian preppin' his garden... 
 
winemaker and farmer

  
after 10 or so batches I think I'm really getting the low temperature raw yogurt down !! Thanks to my friend Charlotte's beautiful raw milk! 

lt's a love hate with the elk they are so majestic... but they are eating my pasture...  



In winery news we got final sign off from the county on some of the last little things that needed buttoning up on the building. Feels good to have the project nearly complete. We pruned the wirtz vineyard .. looks like early bud break this year... we'll see might mean another early harvest... We have a small dirt moving project going on right now to get ready for spring bottling on the 8th. So always something to keep us outta the bars at night. Brian is very excited about the 2014 wines which includes the two we are about to bottle (edelzwicker and rose) 


the beautiful magnums of rose -- we will have a small numbers of these beauties to sell this year from the farm! 

tasting a library Riesling for our spring release dinner


Pruning Wirtz Vineyard


expanding out gravel pad for the bottling truck... not glamorous but necessary : ) 



thanks for visiting... cheers! clare



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