Wednesday, January 30, 2013

A New Year with New Challenges


A tree we decorated for my mom
outside her cabin window
Somehow we all managed to survive the holidays (the wine always seems to help), and now the New Year is steam rolling right along into February.  One of my New Year's resolutions was to avoid alcohol for the month of January, which probably in hind sight wasn't the best idea for a blogger of a winery.  Nevertheless I have been successful, and now that February is knocking on our door with a wine glass in hand, my new resolution will be to post to this blog more regularly.  My father (and owner of Plain Cellars) will also be contributing some posts, which is something I will be looking forward to reading in the near future!

So in the meantime, let me catch you up on the progress of the winery that has happened in the past couple of months...



As the snow level grows higher and the icicles grow longer, the inside details of the winery have started to get checked off the list.

Plumbing, check.
Electrical, check.
Insulation, check.
Drywall, check.

Check, check, check.

But even when the list seems to get shorter, there are always challenges that arise along the way that could not have been foreseen...










The majority of the painting has been done, however there was some over-spray that got onto the concrete flooring that somehow did not get masked off.  (There must be mischievous gnomes that live in this neck of the woods).  Despite knowing who (or what) to blame, my mother spent the weekend on her hands and knees scrubbing paint off the floor.  Two steps forward, two steps back.  This is the constant ebb and flow of construction that we can all have a good laugh about later when the project is long done and over.




While Roxanne scrubbed away, the rest of us tackled the hardwood flooring in the upstairs office of the winery.  It was a true DIY experience with a little bit of a rocky start at first, with "too many cooks in the kitchen," but once everyone settled into their roles, we really got into a groove.  One man on glue, one man lining up the boards so they fit just right, one man cutting the end pieces to size, and one woman hammering away at the nail gun.  I have to say, it wasn't perfect, but when it was all said and done, we were all fairly proud of the work we had done.  And the floor didn't look half bad either!



I think we can all look back at this, have a few laughs, and drink a few glasses of wine- I know January isn't quite over yet, but hey, I've earned it!