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This site is a member of WebRing. To browse visit here. Saturday, April 05, 2008 Stitchin' with the Dogs Many years ago I coordinated a large event for a volunteer group. I asked the secretary of the sponsoring association for the street address of the location, and she gave me the wrong number. The location didn't even exist, in fact. Dozens of people turned up for the event, and many of them were unable to find it. The whole thing was a disaster, and although the error had not been my fault, I was so upset by it that I swore I would never take on something like that again.Today's gathering at the Chateau Morrisette Winery in Meadows of Dan, Virginia, was not quite on the same scale as that ill-fated event of a couple of decades ago, but I was still apprehensive that I would forget something. To my huge relief, it turned out just fine. Twelve of us met to knit or crochet, eat, stitch some more, have dessert, knit some more, take the winery tour and wine tasting (and some of us opted out of the tasting and knitted some more!). Is there a common theme here? By all accounts it went very well, enough that there is some interest in doing it again next year. So here are some pictures:I expected that we'd eat and then get out the knitting. Nope, almost every single person had a project in her hands almost as soon as we sat down.We were seated next to a long wall of sliding glass doors facing out onto a chilly day, but the staff had lit the fireplace, and the room was cozy.After lunch and a leisurely extended period of knitting, coffee and dessert, we walked over to the winery building to take the tour. The weather report was full of gloomy warnings, and I'd had visions of everyone running across the parking lot under umbrellas, with thunder crashing overhead, but we lucked out.These are the huge crushers that turn grapes into grape juice. A couple of the vineyards that supply the winery are just down the road from me, so this is where their crop ends up.After crushing and various stages of filtering, the juice ends up in these huge stainless steel fermenting tanks.The varietal wines go into these oak kegs to age. The kegs are used for four years, and then sold and replaced with new ones. The tour guide said approximately 34,000 gallons of wine are aging here.The winery's original four-spout bottler, from when David Morrisette made wine in his basement.And the new state-of-the-art bottling machine.And then we all convoyed down to Greenberry House in Meadows of Dan, and fondled yarn and fiber! I bought some lucious hand-dyed Blue-faced Leicester roving in shades of purple, that will get spun as soon as I finish spinning up Katy's green Corriedale. (The only problem with having multiple fiber skills is that you end up with multiple UFO's in each one!) But I nearly finished my grandson's sock during the day, so I got in a lot of knitting too. By the way, the title of this post (and the name of our event) comes from the winery's iconic black Labrador dogs. The story is that David Morrisette's pet Lab Hans would lap up any wine that was spilled in the original basement winery. He had a distinct preference for one blend, which was labeled "Trilogy" for the three wines included in it. When the name was changed to "Black Dog," and Hans was featured on the label, sales of the wine took off. A similar name change from "Virginia Riesling" to "Our Dog Blue," to celebrate a later dog owned by a partner, resulted in a similar increase in sales. Now all the winery's advertising and all their wine labels feature their dogs. So when Kristen suggested "Stitchin' with the Dogs" as the name for our event, it seemed like a perfect choice.It was a great day, and worth doing again, though I may not be ready yet for one woman's suggestion to take over the whole winery for a day and have vendors and bands! On the other hand, we could probably get a hundred people or so into one of the large dining rooms . . . posted by Liz @ 9:45 PM | The template is set to display 10 posts. To see all the posts for this month, click on the month name in the Archive section RSS Feed PERSONAL Send email toliz at life-as-a-spectator-sport.com Home I'm a mother, grandmother, a computer professional, Democrat, Christian. I welcome politely worded comments and email, my spam filter throws the rest away, so don't bother to flame me WHY 'LIFE AS A SPECTATOR SPORT' "If you're lucky not to live in the gutters of a slum, but still can't afford to take vacations in the Alps, you're part of that enormous middle class who lives life through the medium of the television, further separated from "real" life by air conditioner, by automobile, by dishwasher, microwave and ice-in-the-door refrigerator, by automatic washer and dryer, and all the other appliances and conveniences that make it possible for America to live life at second hand. I'm not sure why Americans decided that televised drama was better than the real thing, that cardboard microwave food containers were an adequate substitute for real dishes, and their contents for real food, or that cooking, dishwashing and face-to-face conversation wasn't worth the effort and time it required. Someone fed this nation a plastic crate of out-of-season tomatoes and told us it was life and we took them at their word, and we're so much the poorer for it that it's hard to know where to start to list the shortcomings." I wrote this a couple of years ago, but I have to admit it's much less amusing than I thought it would be to see the artifical construct falling apart. THE NON-ELECTRIC HOME Cleaning, 1 Cleaning, 2 Cleaning, 3 KNITTING BLOGS Extravayarnza Knitting Heretic Mind of Winter Pie Knits Persistent Illusion See Eunny Knit The Keyboard Biologist Taleweaver's Ramblings TECHnitting Wendy Knits FINISHED PROJECTS -------FINISHED IN 2006------- Peruvian Cap Tutti-Frutti Socks Shelley's Socks Carol's Socks -------FINISHED IN 2007------- Chain Link Socks Baby Surprise Jacket Valerie & Friend Baby Bonnet Rainbow Baby Socks Girls Pixie Hood Mitred Square Heart Red & White Socks Coffee Cup Pot Holder Nubbins Dishcloth Garterlac Dishcloth Suede Booties Kate's Socks Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap Half Thumbless Mittens Red Mittens for Akkol -------FINISHED IN 2008------- SELF-RELIANCE AND THE FUTURE -- Blogs and websites -- Causubon's Book Club Orlov Food Storage Made Easy From the Wilderness In the Wake Listening to Katrina Survival Topics The Modern Homestead The Oil Drum Notes from a Hillside Farm -- Mailing Lists -- 12vdc Power Living on the Land Rainwater Refrigeration Alternatives Old Ways of Living POLITICAL BLOGS and SITES The political sites have moved BOOKS I'M READING How to Grow More Vegetables, etc. Small Scale Grain Raising ARCHIVES February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 August 2008 July 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 February 2002 Feedjit Live Blog Stats
Many years ago I coordinated a large event for a volunteer group. I asked the secretary of the sponsoring association for the street address of the location, and she gave me the wrong number. The location didn't even exist, in fact. Dozens of people turned up for the event, and many of them were unable to find it. The whole thing was a disaster, and although the error had not been my fault, I was so upset by it that I swore I would never take on something like that again.Today's gathering at the Chateau Morrisette Winery in Meadows of Dan, Virginia, was not quite on the same scale as that ill-fated event of a couple of decades ago, but I was still apprehensive that I would forget something. To my huge relief, it turned out just fine. Twelve of us met to knit or crochet, eat, stitch some more, have dessert, knit some more, take the winery tour and wine tasting (and some of us opted out of the tasting and knitted some more!). Is there a common theme here? By all accounts it went very well, enough that there is some interest in doing it again next year. So here are some pictures:I expected that we'd eat and then get out the knitting. Nope, almost every single person had a project in her hands almost as soon as we sat down.We were seated next to a long wall of sliding glass doors facing out onto a chilly day, but the staff had lit the fireplace, and the room was cozy.After lunch and a leisurely extended period of knitting, coffee and dessert, we walked over to the winery building to take the tour. The weather report was full of gloomy warnings, and I'd had visions of everyone running across the parking lot under umbrellas, with thunder crashing overhead, but we lucked out.These are the huge crushers that turn grapes into grape juice. A couple of the vineyards that supply the winery are just down the road from me, so this is where their crop ends up.After crushing and various stages of filtering, the juice ends up in these huge stainless steel fermenting tanks.The varietal wines go into these oak kegs to age. The kegs are used for four years, and then sold and replaced with new ones. The tour guide said approximately 34,000 gallons of wine are aging here.The winery's original four-spout bottler, from when David Morrisette made wine in his basement.And the new state-of-the-art bottling machine.And then we all convoyed down to Greenberry House in Meadows of Dan, and fondled yarn and fiber! I bought some lucious hand-dyed Blue-faced Leicester roving in shades of purple, that will get spun as soon as I finish spinning up Katy's green Corriedale. (The only problem with having multiple fiber skills is that you end up with multiple UFO's in each one!) But I nearly finished my grandson's sock during the day, so I got in a lot of knitting too. By the way, the title of this post (and the name of our event) comes from the winery's iconic black Labrador dogs. The story is that David Morrisette's pet Lab Hans would lap up any wine that was spilled in the original basement winery. He had a distinct preference for one blend, which was labeled "Trilogy" for the three wines included in it. When the name was changed to "Black Dog," and Hans was featured on the label, sales of the wine took off. A similar name change from "Virginia Riesling" to "Our Dog Blue," to celebrate a later dog owned by a partner, resulted in a similar increase in sales. Now all the winery's advertising and all their wine labels feature their dogs. So when Kristen suggested "Stitchin' with the Dogs" as the name for our event, it seemed like a perfect choice.It was a great day, and worth doing again, though I may not be ready yet for one woman's suggestion to take over the whole winery for a day and have vendors and bands! On the other hand, we could probably get a hundred people or so into one of the large dining rooms . . .
The template is set to display 10 posts. To see all the posts for this month, click on the month name in the Archive section
RSS Feed
PERSONAL
WHY 'LIFE AS A SPECTATOR SPORT'
"If you're lucky not to live in the gutters of a slum, but still can't afford to take vacations in the Alps, you're part of that enormous middle class who lives life through the medium of the television, further separated from "real" life by air conditioner, by automobile, by dishwasher, microwave and ice-in-the-door refrigerator, by automatic washer and dryer, and all the other appliances and conveniences that make it possible for America to live life at second hand. I'm not sure why Americans decided that televised drama was better than the real thing, that cardboard microwave food containers were an adequate substitute for real dishes, and their contents for real food, or that cooking, dishwashing and face-to-face conversation wasn't worth the effort and time it required. Someone fed this nation a plastic crate of out-of-season tomatoes and told us it was life and we took them at their word, and we're so much the poorer for it that it's hard to know where to start to list the shortcomings." I wrote this a couple of years ago, but I have to admit it's much less amusing than I thought it would be to see the artifical construct falling apart.
THE NON-ELECTRIC HOME
Cleaning, 1 Cleaning, 2 Cleaning, 3
KNITTING BLOGS
Extravayarnza Knitting Heretic Mind of Winter Pie Knits Persistent Illusion See Eunny Knit The Keyboard Biologist Taleweaver's Ramblings TECHnitting Wendy Knits
FINISHED PROJECTS
SELF-RELIANCE AND THE FUTURE
POLITICAL BLOGS and SITES
BOOKS I'M READING
How to Grow More Vegetables, etc. Small Scale Grain Raising
ARCHIVES
February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 August 2008 July 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 February 2002
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