Over the years, Peaceful Bend has hosted a few marriage proposals, but yesterday was the first time Clyde & I have ever been a part of the memorable moment.  A few weeks ago, Evan called us to arrange for a special after-hours cellar tour for he and his girlfriend.  The plan was that the ring would magically appear on a wine glass.  Needless to say, my goofy mushy romantic heart just about burst with excitement right then and there!

Fast forward to this week - Evan dropped the engagement ring and a wineglass charm by the winery before the tour so I could add it to a special glass (pictured above).   At the end of the tour yesterday, Michelle “found” the glass sitting on the counter.  At that point, Evan went down on one knee and asked her to marry him.   Michelle said yes (yay!) so Clyde popped the cork on a bottle of champagne for them to celebrate with while I sniffled on about how romantic it all was.

All that and we bottled 400+ gallons of Whittenburg.  Multitasking has never been so fun!

Evan & Michelle - Thanks so much for allowing us to be a part of such a wonderful moment.  Clyde and I wish you both many happy years together.  Cheers!

Our neighbors began haying our fields this week.  They cut it all down on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Last night they came out and raked as much as they could.  This is what the field looked like this morning around 7am.  You can see some of the rows that have been created, and that a lot of it is still loose on the ground in this field.  The dogs and I headed out to take a closer look.

That’s a close look at the rake they used yesterday.  Today I imagine they will finish raking and then bale it all up in the big round bales.  Pepe and Maggie thought these rows of hay were good for one thing:

They had fun, but boy do they stink now.  Baths were needed all around after this morning’s walk!

Well, just a quick note to let you all know that not only do we have Harvest Mist back on the shelf, but we also have Huzzah Valley bottled and for sale again too.  If it’s too hot to be outside this weekend, come join us in the winery salesroom where you can stay cool and enjoy a glass of wine.  Or if you are near Columbia, MO check out the Grand Tasting of the Columbia Food & Wine Festival.  I’ll be there from noon - 6pm on Saturday.  Cheers!

Sorry to go almost a whole week with no posts.  We have been busy bottling and labeling though.  I just have a quick post to let you all know that the Harvest Mist has been bottled.  Today we are bottling Huzzah Valley, so it will be on the shelves again by late afternoon.  Thanks so much for your patience!

Before I get to the mad scientist part of this post, I just wanted to let you all know that Julie will be pouring our wine for the Columbia Wine Festival’s Sip and Shop tomorrow at the Songbird Station (Ste C, 2010 Chapel Plaza Ct, 573-446-5941) from 11am-5pm.  Or until her wine supply runs out!  I’ll be at the grand tasting the following weekend.  Click here for more information about the Columbia Wine & Food Festival.

And now on to the mad scientist part of this post.  I thought I’d show one of the chemistry tests that Clyde has to run before he bottles wine.  This test measures the sulfite level in the wine which is a two-step process.  The picture above shows wine in the round beaker on the right of the stand.  He is bubbling air through the wine and the escaping gases are then run through tubing and into a chemical mixture of some type in the cylinder on the top left.

As you can see the liquid in the cylinder is purple right now.  Air is bubbled through for around 10 minutes and then the mixture in the cylinder is ready for stage two.

Here you see the cylinder has undergone a ‘titration’.  Which simply means that another chemical of some type is very slowly - drip by drip - dropped into the cylinder and stirred in until the color changes from purple to the teal color you see above.  Then, based on how much of the chemical was added to the cylinder, he calculates to find out the sulfur level.

I’m sure my highly technical write-up is full of errors, vagaries, fairy tales, and probably driving Clyde (along with you chemists out there) crazy.  Just check the comments in a day or so if you are chemistry oriented and want to know the real scoop here and I’m sure Clyde will be kind enough to let you know what I’ve glossed over or outright got wrong.

Have a great weekend, and be sure to stop by and say hi while you are in the area!  Cheers.