The Good Life at Cayuse Moses Lake

Our friend Sherry came out for the weekend. We spent a pleasant afternoon sitting on the back patio sampling wine made of grapes from our own vineyard. Sherry got this amazing photo playing around with her phone cam.

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Master Landscaper

Mom came out for a week to whip the landscaping into shape. Can that woman really be 86?!

Chimney Light

And this... a 500 watt halogen flood. Lights up the chimney like a monument.

Mike Kluge, Jr. (M. Kluge & Sons Electrical) hooked it up for me. Top notch.

Barn Light

I've been eager to get this lamp over the shop door. It's a 16" gooseneck with galvanized cage and dusk-to-dawn photocell, made by Barn Light Electric Co. www.barnlightelectric.com.

My pals Gilbert and Lionel helped me hook it up. It's perfect!

Little Brother

Bouncing baby boy, just delivered today.

At the NCAAs in Spokane With Me Boys

Rough Pruning

Taking advantage of some beautiful, shirt-sleeve weather to start rough-pruning the vines, cutting back any dead wood and lopping suckers and any canes I know I won't use. I leave 5 to 6 buds on the remaining canes for now. Just before the buds pop in mid-April I'll go through and do a final prune down to 2 buds each. Double-pruning like this can delay bud-break by a week or so and possibly get you past a late frost that might do bud damage. (It actually worked perfectly last spring!)

Sometimes a finch will fly in, sit on a post a few feet away and trill at me: "Whatcha doing?" And I tell them.

Red-tailed hawks wheeling overhead piercing the quiet with sharp cries.

It's the best job in the vineyard.