My trip to Napa and Auburn!

There's a summer storm brewing outside! With wind, thunder, lighting, the whole sha-bang! I love them because I don't have to water my garden but it also means more time inside. I only get so many summer days and sadly this will probably be my last lazy summer. Since I couldn't go outside I decided I would sit down with a glass of wine and reminisce about a wonderful trip I took earlier this summer to visit some friends where there was lots of warm weather.

It started with a very

very

very

early morning drive down the coast to good old LAX!

There was surprisingly little traffic for once. The early morning was well worth the view of the sun rise along the Malibu coast though and I even made my flight with some time to spare! 

I flew Southwest which turned out to be a nice flight. Does anyone watch TLC's "On the Fly"? Well if you haven't the whole show is about Southwest airlines. Sometimes the people are nice and courteous; other times..... well that's another story. Needless to say I was little worried but my flight was great! There was no assigned seating so you got to sit where ever you wanted and no one sat next me so I wasn't crammed into not only a tiny seat but basically on top of someone. 

                                   

         This is what I got along with a Ginger Ale on the plane. I always get Ginger Ale. 

The size of the picture is very deceiving. 

          This won't even feed a bird.

This is what I saw!

The beautiful California Agriculture 

 

California Coast!

I think Los Angeles is beautiful in its own right.

I landed in Napa and wine tasted my ass off! 
For free!
It pays to have connections......No big

Hello gorgeous Napa Valley!

I tasted at Sterling winery, Castello di Amorosa, and Duckhorn.

Wine, Wine, and more Wine!

Did I say wine? The picture above is at Castello Di Amarosa. After a really fun and exclusive tour (my connections at work) of the castle we had a barrel tasting. My first ever barrel tasting! It was with red wine and I'm not the biggest red wine drinker. I know I'm working on it but, I actually really enjoyed it. One thing I learned however was that I am in capable of swirling my wine glass. The wine looks like the high seas when I attempt it. It was quite comical and I stopped immediately because people began to stare. The picture below was at Duckhorn, a beautiful house with a large wrap around porch you sit out and taste at while you look out at their gorgeous gardens. I could have spent all day there even though it was all reds.

This is what happens after you have had multiple glasses of wine:

You act like a fool in highly public place by pretending to be popping out from behind grape vines and stone columns. That's my tour guide by the way. We'll just call her S.T. for all of time. Me and S.T. toured around St. Helena, Calistoga, and the Napa Valley. It was beautiful.

And hot

And you feel even hotter when you're drinking wine. 

Oh hello extremely zoomed in/blurry photo of Chef Michael Chiarello's house! I'm not stalking you I promise!

One night we went to the Calistoga Inn for dinner and drinks. I'm a poor college student so if somethings going to get cut in order to save money it's of course going to be dinner..... Margaritas and Lemon Drops are way more important than real food. Duh! And at least my dinner was fancy. I mean truffle fries is some high end living stuff there. 

Here we are being tourists

                                                                                 And again.........

And...I think you get the picture

This one pretty much sums up our friendship

On our last day in Napa we ate at this one place. Yeah you know that one place. No? Yeah, me neither. I don't remember what it was called but let me tell you it was amazing!

 Isn't your mouth watering just looking at these! These rolls were amazing! They were these dense sourdough roll, coated and sitting in a pool of olive oil and herbs and dusted with Parmesan cheese. Plus its was like  4 bucks for 6 of these things. Such a steal! And they were so good the next day!
They weren't soggy at all.

Then there was this beauty! Caesar salad, fresh cut mozzarella, fresh tomatoes along with an herb drizzle on top of a delicious flat bread! You fold it up and eat it like a sandwich. I could eat this all day every day. And I'd probably weigh 5 million pounds but hey it would at least be from this deliciousness. I can't wait to go back! 

After Napa me and S.T. went to visit our friend, let's call her P, in Auburn. Her family owns the cutest store The Tin Thimble in the coolest building which was an old fruit packing plant. I don't even know how to describe their business. They have everything you would ever need to sew including patterns and adorable fabric! I had to restrain myself from not purchasing a ton of fabric. My suit case already weighed over 45lbs for only 10 days which I could barely lift (I don't know what I packed ok!). Here's a pic of their really adorable and inventive way of displaying buttons!

They also sell hand dyed wool and other handmade goodies. Well, the reason we came to visit our friend P was because she teaches sewing classes there (there are tons of different classes too) and they were having a fashion show! P is an amazing sewer and makes it look effortless.

Here she goes! It was actually very difficult to snap a shot of her on the adorable runway. The whole fashion show was circus themed! These are the only 2 recognizable pics I got.  She made both the dress and the top! You can read her post on the fashion show here!

                          

The fashion show was so adorable! They had little girls show off the clothes they made in their classes. And for lunch her sister made this delicious tomato and cheese tart. I literally ate like half of a tart (which weren't small let me add) and never got a picture of it because every time I thought about it I had already finished. So I would go get another slice and get distracted by how delicious it looked, chow down, and realize I never took a picture. This deliciously vicious cycle continued until I couldn't eat any more and there were no tarts left. 

From there I spent a few days in Chico for the 4th of July. Theres nothing better than BBQ, drinks, and fireworks with some good friends.

Have you gone on any vacations this summer?