As an agricultural enterprise, we are in synch with our culture’s calendar, developed when the vast majority of people still lived and worked on farms. It’s quiet in the winery and in the vineyards now, so there is time to celebrate the holidays and to reflect both on the past year and the one to come.

Kenneth reports that all of the wines are good and stable, so he can relax. We carefully watched a couple of our Russian River blocks that were hard hit by frost and then ripened quickly with the heat. Something happens when fruit is stressed that increases the chances of getting a stuck fermentation at the end. Because we are very hands-off and gentle, we try to nudge through and we succeeded.

Fruit from other blocks also went through some weather extremes but had enough time to recover and ticked along ripening slowly. That fruit was very sound when it came in, so overall we had it pretty easy in the cellar in 2008.

It’s a silent time in the vineyard. Our crew is gone for the holidays and nothing is happening. We seeded our cover crop for erosion control and the rain has established it. Now the rain is percolating down into the soils to alleviate our drought conditions.

With all that’s going on in the world, we all want a positive and prosperous 2009. Even though we had a tough year farming, mother nature moves on, and we must, too. The beauty of the practice of pruning, which we begin next month, is that it’s a ritualistic taking away of the past year, a process of cleaning up for a fresh start.

As we move into the new year, we will have a new young man join our team. John interned with us and he will now assist Kenneth with winemaking.

January will bring our annual tasting of the previous vintage with famed winemaker Zelma Long and her accomplished viticulturist husband, Dr. Phil Freese. We treasure the perspective and insights they bring to us.

We’ll also look at various clones and selections of Pinot Noir for some new plantings in our Russian River vineyard. And we hope by late spring or early summer to open a small tasting room in Carneros and offer vineyard tours by appointment.

I will have the opportunity to attend some events, including the Best of the Best tasting in Miami and the World of Pinot Noir. As in any business and industry, there is an annual rhythm.

I’m so glad that a big part of my life is agriculture, because nature sweeps you along in its flow. You have to accept its terms, but you also have to keep your own spontaneity and creativity in dealing with it. I’m grateful as well that our project involves estate grown fruit, because even though, for example, we experienced large frost losses this year, we have to take the long view and not attempt shortcuts that will come back later to haunt us. Our reward will be a deeper understanding of our craft.

We all join in wishing you a wonderful new year.

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