{"id":783295,"date":"2010-11-21T23:27:19","date_gmt":"2010-11-21T23:27:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/homeschoolblogger.com\/leigharev2\/?p=783295"},"modified":"2011-10-08T03:59:47","modified_gmt":"2011-10-08T03:59:47","slug":"weekend-with-heidi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/2010\/11\/21\/weekend-with-heidi\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekend with Heidi"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of my WA BFFs, Heidi, called me one day to say that she’s heading south for a visit!\u00a0 What to do…what to do…<\/p>\n

She was on a standby ticket and had hoped to get in late Thursday night, but that did not happen.\u00a0 She did, however, make the first flight out on Friday.\u00a0 I picked her up at the airport and after a little tour of our new digs, went to SF Boudin<\/a> for lunch.\u00a0 We met up with a wonderful young woman named Kelly.\u00a0 She and her husband worked for our WA state church after we had moved.\u00a0 They recently moved this area and our mutual friends keep telling both of us that we needed to meet each other.\u00a0 Since Heidi is friends with Kelly, this seemed a good time to meet.<\/p>\n

Heidi and Kelly
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The three of us…’A’ took the shot…
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After visiting a while, we parted ways and went back to our place.\u00a0 We dropped the boys off at a “Nerf Gun” birthday party, then Heidi and I took off on a road trip!<\/p>\n

First stop….Chik Fil A.<\/a>\u00a0 We had to fuel up for the long (one hour)\u00a0trip…<\/p>\n

We made it to Napa as the sun was setting…
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We stopped at the CAbi<\/a> Outlet Store, where there was a BOGO free deal!\u00a0 Needless to say, I scored….<\/p>\n

The Peju<\/a> winery hosted an open house.\u00a0 We spent a lovely evening there, with a sampling of all their wines and yummy appetizers.
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After the open house, we headed for our hotel. I used Google maps to get us there.\u00a0 It took us on the craziest, “windeyest”, “over the river and through the woodsiest” road!\u00a0 We were the only ones on this road, except for the Porsche who sped up behind us and impatiently waited for me to find a place to pull over so he could fly past.\u00a0<\/p>\n

We checked into our adorable historical boutique hotel, The Sonoma Hotel<\/a>.\u00a0
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It was getting late and we were tired.\u00a0 Especially Heidi.\u00a0 She’d been up since 4am.\u00a0 So, we called it a night and went to bed.<\/p>\n

Here’s where the “fun” begins…I broke out in a big case of hives and my whole body was itching like crazy, especially the soles of my feet and the palms of my hands.\u00a0 I thought I was going crazy!\u00a0 However, as bad as I was, it was nowhere near as bad as poor Heidi.\u00a0 She was sick from about 2am to 6am .\u00a0 It has been something that she has had inconsistently over the past few weeks (she is being tested for gallbladder issues now).\u00a0 Anyway, the next morning looked promising , but she had to take it easy.<\/p>\n

I was up early, so I walked through downtown Sonoma to pick up some ginger ale for Heidi.\u00a0 This is a picture of one of the main streets of Sonoma, our hotel being on the left….
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We decided to drive around Sonoma Valley a bit, and enjoy the lovely colors of a quiet morning…
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We stopped by a neat little store that makes homemade chocolate truffles.\u00a0 Wine Country Chocolates<\/a>\u00a0 The owner\/chocolatier, had just placed two sauce like samples out.\u00a0 They were still warm!\u00a0 These samples were what goes inside the truffles.\u00a0 One was “pumpkin pie”, and I don’t recall the other.\u00a0 Definitely delicious chocolate!
\nThe chocolate machine.\u00a0 It would have been more impressive on video, but I can’t figure out how to make video work with this new format…
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First winery stop of the day: Kunde Family Estate<\/a>.\u00a0 My friend, Betsy, had suggested I check out their reserved tasting.
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We arrived just in time to go on a free, 20 minute wine cave tour.\u00a0 The host packed a ton of information in such a limited time.\u00a0 It was a real treat.<\/p>\n

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At the end of one of the wine caves is about five stairsteps leading to a lovely long table.\u00a0 This is used for parties, dinners, and other events.\u00a0 At the end is a small “stage” and a decorative backdrop that is a piece of the existing earth to show what the land is like.
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This is a view of the reserved tasting area. You sit down at the tasting and try select wines, accompanied with a chocolate at the end.
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This is the view from the reserved area, looking at the regular tasting bar…
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I love the rolling hills of Sonoma Valley, with their patchwork quilt of vineyard colors…
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We found some fields of old vine zinfandel.\u00a0 Some of these vines are still producing grapes and they are over 125 years old!
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Next stop: Imagery Estate Winery<\/a>.\u00a0 This place was hopping.\u00a0 It had a festive party atmosphere compared to the casual and mellow of Kunde.\u00a0\u00a0I should have taken a picture of the tasting room for you to get a sense of what was up, but I just took one pictue the the outside picnic tables…
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I took these pictures of my cell phone’s weather app at the same time of day.\u00a0 Heidi called Craig to check and see if it was really that cold.\u00a0 He said it was warmer by 15-20 degrees.\u00a0 I think he’s in denial.
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We drove back to downtown Sonoma and shopped a little while waiting for our table for lunch.\u00a0 Heidi bought us a housewarming gift at a kitchen shop.\u00a0 It’s a fabulous picnic kit for four.\u00a0 What I love about it is that it is more compact than some other kits I have seen before.\u00a0 It is perfect for us!\u00a0 Thanks Heidi, you complete me…<\/p>\n

We had a delicious lunch at the Girl and the Fig<\/a>.\u00a0 I ordered their du jour, a three course meal.\u00a0 The soup was an incredible roasted chestnut and prosciutto soup.\u00a0 I could eat that for the rest of my life and be happy.\u00a0 The second course was a chicken pot pie with puff pastry.\u00a0 YUM!\u00a0 My final course was a choice between a dessert or cheese plate.\u00a0 I went for the cheese plate.\u00a0 There was a green tomato marmalade on the plat that was perfect with the feta.\u00a0 SO good!!
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Walking back to our car, we caught this comical sight….this man is walking his shetland pony through town…
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Our final stop on our whirlwind Sonoma tour was to Jacuzzi Family Vineyards<\/a>.\u00a0 This family were the actual inventors of the Jacuzzi!\u00a0 I love their logo.\u00a0 This property is a great find for Italian varietals.\u00a0 The tasting is complimentary, which is a nice bonus.\u00a0 They also have a shop called The Olive Press, where they make their own olive oil.
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King Triton is wearing sunglasses.\u00a0 I can’t tell if that adds or detracts\u00a0from this photo… \ud83d\ude42
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We left Sonoma in the wake of this gorgeous sunset…
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Two words, Heidi: DO OVER<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of my WA BFFs, Heidi, called me one day to say that she’s heading south for a visit!\u00a0 What to do…what to do… She was on a standby ticket and had hoped to get in late Thursday night, but that did not happen.\u00a0 She did, however, make the first flight out on Friday.\u00a0 I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-783295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thisnthat"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=783295"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":784585,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783295\/revisions\/784585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=783295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=783295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.centerdeep2.com\/riverbendprep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=783295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}