September 19th and 20th we had the privilege to celebrate our Grand Opening of our new tasting room!  Two days of great wine, food, music and lots of great friends (old ones and new ones!!)!!!  We think we may have seen around 900 hundred of you smiling faces over the weekend!  What a great turnout!!  And we are also very blessed to have wonderful friends and family that jump in and help wherever needed.  THANK YOU!! 

It was great to see the space used as it was intended…..a full tasting room, people strolling the gardens, sitting under the trees, on the patio listening to music.  And the new 2007 Lodi Zin seemed to be a hit too!  Thank you for all of you that came to celebrate with us!  It made it all worth while.  And if you missed it…we missed you, so come see us soon!!!!

  I’ve set down with a glass of Albarino to tend to a very overdue update of our blog.  To those of you who faithfully watch for something new, the latest progress, wine and vineyard updates…..I am VERY sorry.  As many of you know, the last month or two (it’s becoming a little foggy and not because of the Albarino!) have been very busy for us dealing with final construction, landscaping, moving and more.  It seems appropriate that as the year’s labors are about to be realized in the vineyards with harvest, our 3 years of labor are about to be realized with the completion of our tasting room.  Finally, no more construction hats are needed!  The walls are painted, the lights hung and even the toilet paper has found its way to the toilet paper holders that I so carefully picked out a few months back.  Yes, all that’s left is some furnishings, some artwork, a little more landscaping and some badly needed office furniture. 

At the beginning of August we rather quietly moved in, trying to figure our way around our new space.  And when we moved in the space it really felt just like that…..a new space.  A rather empty new space.  But, we soon hosted a group from the Society of Wine Educators for tasting and lunch.  And then we had a great night of celebrating the completion of our Tasting Room with our Wine Club.  And very quickly the space felt completely different to me.  It took on a good Vibe.  A space filled with fun times, new relationships and good memories. And this is just the beginning!  I’ve only had a few sips of my Albarino, so you can’t blame the sentimentality on that.  It is heart felt!!

So, now plans are underway for a Grand Opening Weekend, September 19th and 20th.  We hope that we will see you there to help us create more good memories!!!  We will be celebrating between 12 and 5pm.  Should be a fun weekend of Good Wine, Good Food, Good Music and Good Friends!

I have to say that May has been a crazy, fun, exciting whirlwind of a month from start to finish.  Since we had our kids, I have always said that May is one of the craziest months.  Usually it’s filled with ball games and end of the year school activities.  Well, this month was no different in that respect(YES…Kirsten’s softball team is undefeated to date)!  BUT…this year, the winery has added to the whirlwind!!!  May began with the Lodi International Wine Awards pouring on May 1st.  This was a really fun event with a lot of local people.  Nice size crowd to be able to really talk to people about our wines and our venture.  Fast forward to the next morning and you will find Kyle and I on the road to San Francisco to do our first radio spot on the Gene Burn’s Dining Around show on KGO.  We were lucky enough to be invited to share a little about Harney Lane and to help promote Zinfest.  Mr. Burns and his executive producer were very gracious and we even got to share a little Primitivo with them live.  You can still catch the interview by podcast.

The following Friday night, May 8th we held our first Wine Club event to share a pre-release tasting of our 2008 Dry Rose and 2008 Albarino, our first white wine.  It was a great night packed full of great food, wine and even some flamenco guitar by Jesse Hendricks.  Lots of fun to get to know our wine club members better!!!!

Tom & Irene @ Wine:30 Party

May 15th-17th brought the 100 degree weather and….Zinfest weekend. The Vintners Grill on Friday night at Lodi Lake was a wonderful event.  Our Old Vine Zinfandel, being chosen as one of the 12 Zins of Lodi, was one of the featured wines for the evening.  Then…off and running Saturday morning in preparation for Zinfest Festival.  Kyle even got to talk about our zin at the Wine School along with Tim Holdener from Macchia.  Sunday’s Winery Open Houses was a great day at the winery.  We had lots of familiar faces along with several first time visitors who braved the 100 degree weather to visit us!  And…the Albarino was the BIG hit of the day!!!

We also have had the privalege this month to be on the cover of D’Vine Magazine.  Pick it up and read a bit about us if you get a chance.  You can find a copy at most local wineries.  We think they did a great job on the article.  Thanks Deana and Fran!!  It’s pretty crazy…we have even had to autograph a few copies.  Too funny!

Well…May couldn’t go out quietly so Saturday capped it off.  We had a VERY busy day in the tasting room and we had the pleasure of a mention on KGO’s Dining Around with Gene Burns again.  Seems Mr. Burns had tried our Petite Sirah, which we left as a thank you  when we were on the show.  And he called it “sensational”!  What a great compliment.  We had a few people come to visit for the first time just because they heard that segment. 

What else can I say.  Except it must be nap time.  Just kidding…..while the month has been exhausting….it has been one of the most exciting in this crazy venture so far.  And one of the best parts is that we are seeing lots of familiar faces back time after time so I hope that means we are doing something right.  Until next time….CHEERS!

The last day of January we got initiated into the world of public pourings.  As usual we jumped right in for something big instead of easing into the experience.  So…. we poured for the first time at ZAP Festival which includes about 250 wineries pouring just Zinfandel.  It was a long day but we were well received, especially by the trade, including other wineries.  It was awesome to have other wineries that we have loved and respected for years sending people our way!  What a pat on the back that was!!!

February 14th & 15th we opened up our door for Lodi’s Wine & Chocolate event.  The event was a success area wide and especially for us.  We saw close to 1,000 people over the 2 days and had a great time! We saw some familiar faces (and even a few hardhats) and lots of new ones.  Thanks to all of you who braved the weather to join us for wine, chocolate and chocolate chili!  I’m not sure what was the bigger hit…the wine…the chocolate chili….or the feather boas!

Okay…I think this winery thing may have some extra benefits!  What a great time we had at Harney Lane’s Open House on December 6th!  It seems that most Christmas’ go by so fast that we fail to catch up with many of our friends.  So this year we are blessed because so many of you stopped in to see us and catch up on this crazy adventure we are on.  Thank you all!!!  

The winery building was a bit chilly but it was filled with warm hearts and well wishes.  (And a fair amount of buying too!) Even the harvester generated a bit of attention all decorated up.  AND…I found out that, yes, we DID win third place in the light parade in the RV and Truck category.  (I guess it’s hard to figure out exactly what category a grape harvester fits in to!)

Anyway, Kyle & I, along with my parents (Kathy & George), want to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a new Year filled with many blessings!!!!!  Stop and take a breath and enjoy the pleasures of the season.  One of those pleasures may even be a little Harney Lane Wine.  Merry Christmas!!!!

November 8th & 9th we pulled out all the stops to get ready for Lodi’s First Sip Event!  It was well worth the work as we had a great turnout and made lots of new friends already!!!  The week before was CRAZY!  In fact, we still had to run extension cords for power and luckily…the plumber placed the toilet Friday afternoon.  Just in the nick of time! 

That said, we had lots of positive feedback and people were good sports about wearing their “construction” hats.  We’ve been planning for soooo long that it seemed a bit surreal to actually be holding a public tasting event.  BUT….it was a very encouraging start and the days went pretty smoothly!

We are taking one weekend off (Nov 15th & 16th) to try and get most of the construction wrapped up and then starting November 22nd we will open for weekends.  If we missed you last weekend, we hope we will see you SOON!  CHEERS!