News

June
Curious how busy we are around the vineyard and winery these days? So busy that it’s already the middle of July and we’re just getting time to update the website!

Things have settled in to a nice groove around here… three winemakers all aboard and pouring, the grapes are looking fantastic, the weather is beautiful, and other than the normal squirrel “infestation” things are about perfect. And then we remember we’re about six weeks until harvest.

Blended now has an Online Wine Shop, find it under “The Wines” in the menu at the top of this page. Currently only La Vie Dansante and TASS wines are listed but Medeiros Family wines should be coming soon. One small issue is that except for La Vie Dansante wines the wine club member discounts aren’t working on the sales site. You can purchase wine but it won’t recognize your member discount. This is due partially to some work needing to be done at our end but also some background programming that needs to be completed so we’re not sure how long it will take.

Interested in joining one of the three wine clubs? Find information and an online sign-up process under “The Wines” in the menu at the top of this page as well. That part works perfectly.

June
Can you believe we’re half-way through 2017 already? If you think that’s amazing… as I write this the puppy and I are hiding from the rain outside. That’s right, rain. In June! In California!! Normally this is where we’d all say “thank God, we can really use the moisture” but this year, not so much. It was so wet this spring that the vines are going crazy. Last week we mowed down the cover crop – for the third time this season. Usually we only do it once, sometimes twice, but never three times. Today we got about halfway through hedging. “Hedging” is when we go through the vineyard and clip each cane down to about four feet long. This helps balance out the leaves to cluster ratio and opens up the canopy to let the wind blow through. The vines have been so vigorous that the canes were almost 7 feet long and were starting to drag on the ground.

We’ve been continuing on improvements to the tasting experience. Last month our third winemaker, Ron Mosley from TASS, joined us in the Tasting Room and this month we’re working hard on the landscaping leading up to the Tasting Room. Nothing fancy – remember, we’re “Rustic” – just a couple of planter boxes and crushed granite to walk on instead of weeds/mud. We’re also going to keep the grass in front of the winery building, in the picnic area, and in the oval in the parking lot green to help provide some relief from the summer heat. It means a lot more time mowing each week but we think it really helps the scenery. It’s been pretty hot a couple of weekends already. It’s not so much the air temperature as there has been a complete lack of wind. We’re working on it. Not the lack of wind, not much we can do about that, but we’re planning to add an evaporative cooler in the Tasting Room to circulate cool air.

June and July are pretty slow in the winemaking side of the business. We’re cleaning, bottling, and starting to think about Harvest 2017. There’s that huge list of chores that we’ll “get to before next harvest” to start on but we can put it off for another few weeks. Hey, it doesn’t seem right if we’re not panicked!

If you haven’t stopped by recently grab a picnic lunch and come on down. Ted from Medeiros Family Wines has released his 2014 Merlot and 2014 Saudade. The Saudade this year is predominately Cabernet franc and it really stands out. Jeff from La Vie Dansante released his “Spring Rosé” this week. It’s based on Mourvèdre and is light, crisp, and perfect for the hot summer afternoons to come.

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