Temecula Trip

We just took Nathan on his first ever trip/vacation and he was amazing throughout the whole weekend. We were a little nervous about how he would take the 6.5 hour drive to Temecula (normally 5-5.5 hours, but we were expecting a few baby stops. No, not small stops, like baby steps, but stops to tend to the baby, you know feeding, diaper changes, that sort of thing). But to our amazement and delight, Nathan was perfect. He sat in his little car seat either sleeping or looking around the whole way. Even when he was a little fussy it was only for a few minutes when we were looking to stop for lunch and he was getting hungry. Even during the wedding he was a calm, happy baby and instead of loud crying at bedtime (which he has been known to do) he simply fell asleep, even with the loud wedding music playing. I don't know what everyone is talking about, this baby thing is cake! (knock on wood and all that stuff so as to not offend the karma guy from high atop the thing)

This was also our first time to Temecula, heading out there for one of my best friend's wedding at Falkner Winery. And since we enjoy wine country, we stayed an extra day to do a little wine touring. But first the rehersal dinner and wedding.

Rehearsal at the winery: Nathan rehearsing his crawling while daddy rehearses walking down an imaginary aisle.

Nathan enjoying the winery

"Fake grass? But it feels so real!"

"ASU!! ASU!!"

So we didn't think Nathan could get any cuter, and then we put him in his little ASU jacket and took turns squeezing him to bits.

Friday night at the wedding:


And then we put him in his little red vest and took turns squeezing him to pieces.

In the hotel room (obvisouly):

Don't you just want to pick him up and squeeze him?

Winery Picnic:

We only visited two wineries on Saturday. Normally (as in the few times we've been to Napa/Sonoma) we hit 4-5 wineries per day, but we figured we would need to cut back to accomodate the teenie guy and stay relaxed. Also, we usually plan a winery picnic during our tour because, well, it's fun, we get hungry, it helps to sober us up, and it refreshes our palate for the next round of tastings. So to continue with our tradition, we picnicked on the picturesque hill atop which sits Cougar Winery. Picturesque, beacause, well I took this picture. A little arid, but still not a bad way to enjoy some grub with the teenie guy. The wines were so-so, but we did pick up a rosé that was surprisingly good.

The other winery we visited was Ponte, which turned out to be better than our first impression. I say that because as we entered it was packed and looked very commercial, which in our experience tends to coincide with a lack of personality and character and when tasting wine, we like a little character. But we bellied up to the bar at the right place because our server was friendly, knowledgeable and engaging. On top of that the wines were pretty good too. We each had 6 tastings and the bartender offered generous pours, which was fine since we had planned to eat an early dinner there anyway.

If you are considering a trip to wine country, Temecula provides a great value as it is a short drive away and offers a variety of unique wines that you will not find anywhere else, mainly because the wineries are fairly small and are not sold anywhere else. So if you've never been I would recommend a visit.