10.15.11  Today Zach and I went to the Huskies vs. Colorado Buffalo football game.  My longtime friend, Brehani, came here from Arizona to visit her family, (they also have season tickets.) She let me know last week that she'd be in town and wondered if I was going to the game.  I'm so glad I got to see her!  She looks exactly the same and she is the only friend I keep in contact with from college.  We both lived in the same dorm our freshman year, and believe it or not, after our first year, she moved to California to go to Brooks College to study interior design but we are still friends.  So good to see you my friend!  Oh, and the Huskies kicked some major butt today and beat the Colorado Buffalos 52-24!  Yep - it was a great game!

Kylie had another dentist appt last week and the dentist is really happy with her progress with her braces and her headgear.  He actually told her she is about 2 months ahead of schedule!  Yay!  Phase 1 will be over in February and Phase 2 will start.  That means she'll get braces on all her teeth.  Good job sister wearing your headgear and being responsible about it!  Look at the difference from this month to last Nov when she got her braces on! Incredible!

10.13.11  Today is the 6 year anniversary of my Dad's passing.   Not a day goes by that I don't miss him or think of him.  He would be proud of all of us in what we've accomplished in the last 6 years.  I miss him and love him and am doing my best to honor his memory so he continues to be proud.  Miss and love you tons Dad.

Kylie is having a phenomenal soccer season!  The hardest part has been due to injuries and absences on game days.  We have not had subs for the past 3 games.  But, the girls played so great against a team that we lost to 4-1 the last time we played.  The other team had 3 subs and even those girls said they were tired.  Whew!  They played great overall. The other team scored with just 6 minutes to go.  Kylie was so close to scoring off a corner kick...it was right up the end line and if only someone had just tapped it in!  It was like slow motion everyone watching the ball.  Good game girls! 

Our 4th and final stop was the Franciscan Winery.  They mass produce 370,000 cases of wine per year.  Very big winery. We didn't taste wine here but we were able to go out to the vineyards and hear about the harvest process and actually taste the grapes right off the vine!  Incredible stuff!

We came to another small winery that produces 30-40,000 cases of wine per year.  We were able to go through the processing plant while we sampled the wines.  Very cool to hear about the process and see the massive machines. 

We stopped at the V. Sattui winery for tastings and lunch.  We actually skipped the tastings here and ate instead.  They were offering an outdoor bbq in a picnic area.  Very good food and great weather!  We were able to tour the wine cellar on our own. We watched some workers emptying the grapes from the bins into a destemmer machine.  The grapes went one way and the stems went another.  Pretty cool stuff!  He even walked over and let us sample the grapes, seeds and all, right off the cluster.  Very sweet.

We took an all day tour on a shuttle bus to 4 different wineries, with tastings at all and food at one of  them.  We learned so much about wine!  And, tasted some very nummy ones!  The first winery we stopped at was the Andretti Winery.  Yep, after Mario Andretti himself.  Once he retired from racing, he opened a small winery that produces 30-40,000 cases of wine a year.  We had a private wine tasting out on the back patio.  Beautiful!  And, the best part was I won a free bottle of wine in a door prize drawing - lucky us!

There were some amazing buildings around town, sites from the Fisherman's Wharf, the ferry building and on the ferry coming back from Vallejo into the city.  Also, just some random pictures around the ferry building.  Even a dock full of sea lions that were loud, stinky and a huge mass of  them.

We took the airtrain from the airport to the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transport) station.  This is just like our light rail system.  Ours is much cleaner, probably because it's newer, but an inexpensive way to travel.  We also took the F train which took us to and from the Fisherman's Wharf and the ferry building.  On our trip back from Napa Valley, we took a ferry ride from Vallejo back into the city.