In what has apparently become an annual adventure for the two of us, we depart the comfy confines of Old Town and head to one of our dream destinations in search of a little rest and relaxation to mask the fact that we've (or more specifically, Wendy has) somehow grown a year older much too quickly. And though it might not be some sort of youthful potion or magic elixir, we've discovered that copious amounts of sun, food, and wine, tend to do just the trick in obscuring our focus from our aging vessels. Instead, we fixate on the wonderful time were having, placing our concerns more in the realm of fun and enjoyment. I like to think it keeps us young.

If you follow us on Instagram you likely saw some of our hijinks as we spent several days in Northern, California.

We started our journey in one of our favorite places on the planet, Carmel-by-the-Sea on the Monterey Peninsula. This was actually Wendy's fourth time to Carmel, and my fifth (counting a 1st grade trip with my parents some 30 years ago during Clint Eastwood's mayoral term in the city). The thing that's interesting about Carmel is that each time we return, we find it just a little bit harder to leave.

I don't know if it's the sound of the crashing waves, the sea air, the consistently cool, comfortable, and crisp weather, or the fact that it feels like something out of a fairytale, neither of us feel like we can get enough.

Now that we're so familiar with the area, we tend to spend our time doing the things we enjoy the most. When in Carmel, do as the Carmellons (I don't think that's actually what they're called), which means walking on the beach...

...and watching (very proud and very wet) dogs run all over the place...

...and occasionally take a break or two to eat and drink at some of the good restaurants and bars in the area.

In addition to our primary destinations, the California coast has an abundance of National Parks that are essentially a stones throw from just about anywhere. One of the closest to Carmel is Point Lobos, right on the coast just a few minutes south on Highway 1.

From idyllic and picturesque settings...

...to frolicking seal pups annoying their mothers...

...this park is a perfect place to spend a whole day hiking around.

The red you see on the tree is a type of algae that grows on the trees in this Pacific Cypress grove, one of only two left in the world. 

At one point during our hike we even happened upon a little ground squirrel who was mugging for the camera, hoping for a few human treats. I'll tell you one thing for sure, Lulu would've gone nuts!

Before heading out to Point Lobos we stopped by The Cheese Shop in Carmel to pick up some hiking necessities, such as a baguette and a few small samples of cheese. We also brought some fruit, nuts, and water from home. Together, on a picnic table nestled against a calm water inlet, we enjoyed a nice little lunch with a backdrop of nearby seals popping up out of the kelp and floating just off the rocks.

If there's one thing about Carmel and the California coast in general that truly stands out in my mind, it's the treat you get when a clear evening grants you an amazing sunset. Everyone in the area gathers to watch the spectacle as the sun slowly falls into the Pacific Ocean...

...giving all of the spectators a spectacular display of fire and light.

Before leaving Carmel, we drove around some of the more outskirt areas of the town to check out all of the houses that are for sale that we can't afford. 

It seems like no matter where you turn, the houses are simple adorable. Oh lottery, why can't we win you?

Carmel even has a beautiful Frank Loyd Wright house nestled right into the rugged coastline.

Begrudgingly, we left this town where we hope to one day live, and headed up to the valley, where we one day hope to live close enough to that we can enjoy it more frequently. That's right, Napa Valley wine country!

Now that we've been going to the Napa Valley and surrounding wine country for eight straight years, we've really started to establish our favorite places to taste, tour, and dine. But with over 200 vineyards in the Napa Valley alone, and more good restaurants than we could cover if we lived there full time, we commit ourselves half of our stops new places each year, while spending the rest of our time at places we already know and enjoy.

One interesting aspect of our trips is that we simply can't leave the old "home improvement" bug behind. Everywhere we go we're looking at various items for ideas or inspiration on our home. It's a bit odd to look at California for things that can help us in our home, but our focus of late has been on our options for our patio area. A great inspiration for the feel we'd love to establish is in the patio area of the restaurant, Brix.

The setting just has that certain something we'd love to somehow accomplish in our outdoor space, though our area is significantly more modest. Perhaps we should focus more on the casual setting behind Gott's Roadside? Perhaps more attainable? Maybe?

As one of our most surprising and memorable moments of our entire vacation, we ended up with a chance encounter that simply blew our minds. While enjoying the wonderful Napa Valley weather on the patio at Sequoia Grove, another of our favorites, we decided it was time to head out. Wendy and I approached the counter to purchase a few bottles of wine when another customer of the vineyard approached us and said "I'm sorry to interrupt, but do you run a blog?" Incredulous, we responded, "Yes, we do." She went on to tell us how she and her husband, from Indianapolis, had made the trip to Napa Valley and were using our three day Napa Valley itinerary as a guide. We. Were. Floored!

Our itinerary is several years old now and can definitely use an update given all of our new favorites, but we're unbelievably flattered that people are actually using our recommendations. Also, what are the chances that someone on a trip from the midwest just happened to use our itinerary as a guide, then ended up in the same vineyard as us (out of 200 plus), at the same time as us, and recognized our faces? It's just crazy, really.

We'll go into more detail on our various Napa Valley stops when we update our recommendations, but we had a wonderful time throughout our three days and were already looking forward to our next trip before we even left the smell of the vines and clink of the bottles.

We wrapped up our trip with a brief stop in San Francisco to spend a few hours with friends who live in the heart of the city and then headed home to good old Alexandria, Virginia. It was another amazing and memorable vacation in so many ways. From visiting favorite places to discovering so many new spaces and experiences, we're fortunate to be able to experience these wonderful locales and hope our adventures can inspire you to try it out as well.

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Although it's hard for me to believe there's anyone out there that wouldn't love it too, in the last week one of our crew members here at Old Town Home has made it known she wasn't happy we made a quick departure for the west coast. Do you have any guesses who that might be? Here's a hint.

Yep, that's right. This innocent face has been in a little bit of a snit since we've been back. 

Ordinarily Lulu is a dream. Our 30 pound rescue pup is sweet, loving, and mostly a couch potato. (Well, a couch potato after her first five minutes of sheer jumping mania when she says hello.) There's only been one other period in our time with her that she went on a pillow throwing, crate and Easter basket-eating tirade, but we thought we were past that. I guess we were wrong. 

Since we've been back from California, our Ori Pei has been on a tear. Literally. If you're a pillow in this house, you're not safe. And rather than merely throw them on the floor, like she did in her tirade period that I referenced, this time she's making it rain snow.

Last weekend, after a quick trip to Target, Alex and I came home to the following site. 

What looked like a freak May snowstorm in our sun porch, was actually the stuffing of a really old, and pretty ugly pillow leftover from my college days. Luckily I don't care about the pillow, but it's the look on her face that really makes me concerned. This big grin is one that says, "revenge is best served cold and while you're out of the house." I'm pretty sure that if she could extend a middle finger, she'd be waving it at the camera. 

The sun porch drama happened again the following day, this time to a much lesser extent. In this case, yet another ugly pillow left from Alex's college days suffered a bit of a flesh wound. 

I suppose she felt we weren't rattled or warned enough following the sun porch incidents. So in order to really drive her point home that it's not cool to up and leave her for wine country (or anywhere for that matter), Lulu moved her plan of attack upstairs, this time to our bedroom. 

On two separate days, Lulu went after the pillows on our bed. She was careful in her strategy to remove the decorative pillows and Euro shams, and go straight for our sleeping pillows. What we were left with looked like a (very tame) scene out of a Nightmare on Elm Street movie. 

Freddy Kruger's Lulu's work was pretty impressive. She managed to successfully shred two pillow cases without damaging the feather pillows themselves. Despite the fact that these pillow cases were wedding gifts, they are now going on ten years old and were in need of replacement anyway. Don't tell Lulu, but we thought her antics were a little funny, given she destroyed only things in our home that needed to be retired anyway. Wait a second? Maybe she wants in on the decorating action, and is trying to tell us something? Something like "Hey guys, I know you've had these pillows and pillow cases for a while, but don't you think it's time for a bit of a scenery change?"

We haven't broken the news to her yet, but a few ripped up pillows aren't going to be enough to keep me from visiting my happy place. We'll just have to figure out a way to get those long legs of hers tucked inside a carry on bag for our next trip. :-)

Do your pets act out when you go on a trip? Or maybe like Lulu, they prefer to wait to show their displeasure until you've returned? What's the most destructive pet attack that's happened in your home? Hopefully like us, only unimportant items have been affected. 

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When we were on vacation last week in California, we took advantage of the change of scenery to check out some of the local sites. What we came across in both Napa and Sonoma were charming, quaint, and modestly sized homes -- just what we love!

So we quickly turned into weirdos, walking up and down streets, stopping, pointing, mouths agape, snapping photos of the homes that caught our eye. So today's Opening Housing post will be a bit of a departure from our norm. Instead of touring the inside of a single home for sale and critiquing it, this time we'll be showing you some of our favorite homes from the outside, regardless of if they're on the market or not. 

We'll start our tour in Sonoma on a street just minutes from the main town square. There are several homes that were quite large and impressive, but we gravitated towards the homes we could more easily see ourselves living in. Let's start with this gorgeous home for example. I loved the exterior color scheme and the gorgeous landscaping, and the big bay of windows was to die for. (Although, I suppose without curtains it would allow for your neighbors to get to know you really well.)

Next up was this charming home. Its perfectly manicured lawn and towering old tree were stunning, and we loved the pop of color introduced by the front door.

This cute Spanish style home had great landscaping and interesting architectural details. We loved the arched doorway, but if we owned it, we'd select a new paint scheme with additional colors that would better highlight some of the features, including the clay tile roof.

This beautiful home was set off by an interesting front fence and gate. The potted arrangements were dramatic and beautiful. Once you looked past the gate, the home itself was also beautiful and well cared for. 

Just beyond the last home, a very pleasant tudor style home caught my eye. I have a particular fondness for this style of home, and this was a great example of one. The landscaping unfortunately hid a lot of this charming house, but I loved it nonetheless. 

The next home was what I think of when I think of California living. This charming sunny home just oozed character. I loved the color scheme, the arched door, the interesting walkway and the beautiful front porch. If it were our home we'd probably change the white garage door to something that went a bit more with the rest of the house, but otherwise, it was quite nice.

A few more houses down the street we found this well cared for and charming home, but what really caught our eye was the succulent driveway. What a neat idea!

Here's another look at the "succulent" house from the other angle, so you can get a feel for just how adorable is.

Can you say super cute? How great is the shutter color on the house below? I just love the pop of raspberry on the neutral backdrop, and the crisp white trim looks so clean and fresh.

This next home's front porch was fantastic. Can't you picture you and your family relaxing in this beautiful space, enjoying the sunny California weather with a glass of local wine in your hand? I sure can.

I have a thing for nice porches, and the next home fits the bill. This beautiful home has a paint color that reminds me of yellow cake batter. With a porch to die for, beautiful landscaping, and a rustic split rail fence, I think I'm in love.

All of the homes I've mentioned were in the historic portion of Sonoma, which means they are all somewhat old and more in line with what we typically like. However, we found several places that we really enjoy on the other side of the mountain in Napa Valley, and these were all built in the 1960s and beyond. This particular neighborhood is adjacent to the Silverado Resort, our "home away from home" when we venture to wine country, and I love to walk this street every time we visit. I particularly love the home below, and think of it as the California version of our home. (In person, the color scheme is very similar to ours.) 

I'm also madly in love with this home. This French country inspired abode exudes charm and European flair. 

On the same street sits this California beauty. I love the standing seam roof, the detail of the windows, and the architectural interest of the portico.

Last but certainly not least is this home, chosen not for its unbelievable curb appeal but more for the fact that it's home to a cluster of palm trees. How cool is that? It makes me think of the Mad Men episodes when Don went to California to visit the "real" Mrs. Draper. 

So there you have it. Our tour of a handful of California homes that stopped us in our tracks. 

And now for our game...

Would You Trade? (Or in today's case, would we trade our home in Old Town Alexandria for any of the homes above in wine country?)

Wendy: Absolutely yes, but not now. What do I mean by that? If you're a frequent reader of the blog, you know that I am completely in love with Napa Valley. But a large portion of the allure is being able to sample wines and the amazing cuisine at a leisurely pace, without the stresses of career or commuting. So in other words, I'd trade in a second if I didn't have to work a 9 to 5 job. So where that leaves me is putting off a move to the Golden State until after retirement. Only thirty odd years and I'm there.

Alex: I don't think I could do it, and this might cause a problem for us at some point in the future. I love many of these homes, and I really enjoy visting the area and looking at these places, but my heart is with really old homes, the older the better. I'd much prefer one of the mid to late 1800's homes in the area, but they are so few and far between that I fear they'll all be either owned or too expensive for our budget. But I do have to agree with Wendy on at least one point -- a move out west might not be a bad thing, but we couldn't see ourselves doing it until after we retire. Thirty years, perhaps, but we'll see if we can do it sooner. 

For those of you who are newer readers, our game of "Would You Trade?" is based on the ridiculous notion that we would have the opportunity to trade our house for the Open Housing house straight up, where price is not an issue. Sometimes the result is obvious, sometimes not so obvious, but usually it is based almost entirely in the ridiculous. I hope you enjoy.

Interested in reading about other interesting homes for sale? Want to offer your take on "would you trade?" Check out the Open Housing section of Old Town Home.

So what do you think? Should we pick up our roots in exchange for a home on the other coast? Of all of the homes pictured above, do you have a favorite? 

We'd also like to remind you that today is the last day to enter the contest to win a $100 gift certificate from The Home Depot, just in time for Mother's Day. Simply leave a comment on this post to enter. The winner will be announced tomorrow.

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So what did we do for Wendy's birthday? We went to Nap Valley! No, seriously, we did.

Actually, this all started several months ago when I asked Wendy what she wanted for her birthday. Half joking but completely serious, she said "I'd really like to go to Napa Valley." At the time, I had no issues with this and I figured it would make a very cool and very fun trip. Unfortunately, my job had other ideas.

The major project I've been working had finally received an end date. However, this end date set a vacation blackout date that happened to land right smack dab in the middle of the time we were planning to board a plane to the west coast. I had to call Wendy to let her know the sad news. She was rather disappointed but knew there was nothing I could do about it. To make matters worse, due to work commitments in both of our jobs, this past week was the only viable window for the trip, so no trip the first week of May would mean no trip until possibly September or beyond.

But wait, Wendy's frown was about to turn upside down. About two weeks ago there was a last minute change in plans on my project and that opened up the previously blacked out vacation dates. I swung into action and began planning Wendy's last minute Napa Valley adventure, as she requested. By the end of the night we had airline tickets purchased, wonderful sitters for Lulu and Mel, and hotel accommodations at our favorite place, the Silverado Resort, all lined up. With everything in order, last Sunday we boarded a plane for San Francisco and headed west to our ultimate destination, California Wine Country.

If you're a frequent reader of our blog, or a follower on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Pinterest, you may already know of our love for wine. (In fact, we've written a three part itinerary if you're interested in planning a trip of your own.) Our true enjoyment actually stems from our love of Napa Valley, and we make every attempt possible to go back for at least a short trip every year. Though we are already very familiar with the area and our favorites, there are dozens of places (both vineyards and restaurants) that we've never had the chance to experience. We decided to commit ourselves to trying out some places we've never visited on this trip, and we're quite glad we did. Today we'll share the vineyards we visited on the trip in hopes that it will either help you on your trip planning, or inspire you to consider a vacation to the Napa Valley.

After a short stop in San Francisco to see some friends who recently moved to the area, we jumped in our rental car and headed out over the Golden Gate bridge to make the short trip to the Napa Valley.

Though we've made the drive fairly regularly over the last six years, we both still fall in love with the area each time we see the first vineyards of the trip at the edge of the Carneros region.

Almost as soon as we arrived and checked into our room we headed out for our first dinner at one of our favorite places, Brix. 

The weather was absolutely perfect so we ended up sitting on their outdoor seating/garden area. The back of the restaurant looks out onto vineyard property and over the mountains. It's one of those places that has such an unbelievably relaxing feeling to it that we started planning out how we could make our own backyard feel like this one. Granted, we don't have the space, mountains, weather, etc, but hey, we can try. We're such home improvement nerds we can't help but to scheme and plan when we see ideas or inspiration, no matter how far fetched the implementation may actually be.

For dinner we enjoyed a perfectly cooked pizza while we planned out the rest of our trip. Traveling somewhere, especially a significant distance over several time zones, tends to leave us completely exhausted (which seems dumb since we're just sitting on a plane). This type of a relaxing dinner in a comfortable and familiar setting goes a long way to making us feel at ease and right at home.

On Monday we woke up bright and early (a three hour time change will do that to you) and headed out to the somewhat touristy but rather famous, Chateau Montelena.

If you're not familiar, Chateau Montelena is the vineyard featured in the movie Bottle Shock. It was one of the vineyards that helped to put the Napa Valley wine industry on the map when they were awarded first place in the 1976 "Judgement of Paris" wine competition. It was a major coup in which several American wines bested their French counterparts in a blind tasting that was judged by several French judges. The 1973 Chateau Montelena Chardonnay is now revered in the lore of California wines, as is the 1973 Stag's Leap Cabernet Sauvignon, the winner in the red's category. Here's one of the remaining bottles of the famous 1973 chardonnay on display in the chateau's tasting area and lobby.

Though we arrived too late to get a tour of the vineyard (it's limited to just six people, first come, first served, each Monday), the person who led our tasting give us a behind the scenes tour of the main building's private and entertaining quarters. The building was built in 1882, so this tour was right up our "historic home nerd" alley.

The area is typically only made available to limited corporate events or to friends of the vineyard's owners, so it was cool to get to see the nicely and period decorated spaces. We also got a glimpse at their very nice kitchen area. Again, we try to take inspiration from just about anywhere we can, so a look at this type of a layout may very well end up in our home, even if you can fit three of our kitchens in this one.

One of the things we like to do whenever we are in Napa Valley is to talk with the locals to learn what we should do. It's good to remember that all of the people working at the vineyards are typically well informed and very friendly locals, and they usually all have a passion for wine and food, so it's great to take advantage of their knowledge of the area to further plot your vacation. On this day we struck up a great conversation while tasting the wines at Montelena and learned of several new places that we should try.

From Chateau Montelena we headed over to Schramsberg Vineyards for a sparkling wine tasting. We first learned of Schramsberg from a friend's recommendation, and then were told they have "the best bubbles in the valley," during our conversation at Montelena. 

This is another very historic and well known vineyard in northern part of the Napa Valley towards Calistoga. Founded in 1862, and constructed over several years, the original owner hired the workers who built the transcontinental railroad to dig, with shovel and axes, the extensive network of over two miles of tunnels within the mountain side. The tour covered a large number of the tunnels and was a real treat to see. Though you can't really see it in the photo, the stone walls, candle light, and cobwebs covering the walls felt like you had walked into an Indiana Jones movie. It was really cool.

Yes, those guys are stacking bottles for long term storage and aging.

During the tour we came across Ramon "The Riddler" Vierra. No no, not like in Batman, but this guy is a rock star in the champagne and sparkling wine industry. As part of the traditional methods of champagne production, a person must turn and tilt the bottles in a riddling rack to get the yeast that was added to the bottle to create the bubbles you see in sparkling wine to settle into the neck of the bottle. It's a process that takes time, expertise, and a tremendous amount of organization and patience. 

I say Ramon is a rock star because he's been riddling for 37 years and was responsible for the turning of all bottles of Schramsberg's annual production until he went into partial retirement. He now only works a few days per week, but he's just as fast as ever. Ramon has been officially clocked as the fastest riddler in the world, turing as many as 50,000-60,000 bottles in a single day of work. Here he is in action making precise turns and tilts on each and every bottle in the rack.

When he's at full speed he can turn and adjust every bottle on both sides of a riddling rack in under nine seconds.

We finished up our tour at Schramsberg with a very enjoyable sampling of some of their offerings, including their famous Blanc de Blanc, which was served by president Nixon during the 1972 "Toast to Peace" in Beijing, China to show the world that the United States had a worthy sparkling wine. Since that event, Schramsberg has been on The White House's menu for a state dinner at least once under each and every presidential administration.

Next up we stopped in at another "new to us" vineyard called Ehler's Estate. Located rather close to Schramsberg, this is yet another very historic vineyard building. We were apparently all about history on this day as every vineyard we went to was constructed in the late 1800's.

The very old and cool main building of Ehlers was built in 1886 (the same time as our house), and houses a very relaxing lounge type area where you can taste their wines at either their tasting bar or while sitting on a couch. It's a very nice and enjoyable atmosphere that we never would have discovered if we hand't talked with a local.

The wines we tried at Ehlers were quite good and enjoyable, so mark another win in the "recommended by a local" column.

Along the way on this first day we purchased four bottles of wine. I think we had planned on purchasing six total during the three days we were spending in the area. The thing is, the shipping crates for getting our wine home come in groupings of six, and our decision to buy four on the first day left us little room to buy more on the next two days. As a result, Wendy and I made the executive decision that we'd need to commit to buying 12 bottles of wine, you know, to be sure to fill up the shipping container. After all, it is Wendy's birthday, and if this is what she wanted, this is what she got. :-)

The next day we decided to cover a couple of our favorite vineyards that we've enjoyed in the past. Most of the places we're familiar with are in the Rutherford and Oakville areas. We decided to make our first stop at Sequoia Grove, a vineyard that we absolutely love and felt so completely comfortable at last year, that we noted it easily as one of our favorites. Aptly named, the vineyard is centered on a small grove of rather large sequoia trees.

Beyond the trees, the bottle formats they offer go all the way up to the Goliath (one up from the Nebuchadnezzar, yes these are the real names). That huge bottle in the center behind Wendy holds a whopping 27 liters or the equivalent of 36 standard bottles of wine. Can you say "Generous pour?"

The best part about this tasting is the fact that you can take your glass out into the garden area and just enjoy the surroundings. We actually enjoyed the surroundings for quite some time. Sipping, enjoying, sipping, enjoying, you get the idea.

We also had to keep working at our now 12 bottle commitment. As a result we purchased a few bottles to enjoy at home. I guess we had to take one for the team.

We then continued our no appointment necessary tastings by going over to Grgich Hills nearby. This is another vineyard we "discovered" during our last trip and wanted to pay another visit. 

The vineyards founder, Mike Grgich, is actually the winemaker responsible for the Chateau Montelena 1973 Chardonnay I mentioned earlier. It's interesting just how intertwined all of these stories are in Napa Valley. It seems like everyone knows everyone and it's all this large wine making family. 

If you've never been to a large vineyard for a tasting, the thing that's I find the most interesting is that the majority of the various tasting counters are actually right along side of the wine production and/or storage areas. This means that while you're sipping their latest release, you're often looking at the barrels or vats the future releases are aging in.

Another cool thing about the various places is that each has its own distinct architecture, style, and feeling, and each is heavily set by the person who you're talking and interacting with during your tasting. Essentially, I'm saying that the employees of the vineyard's tasting room make all of the difference in the world as to the enjoyment you'll derive from the event. It's amazing just how much a good or bad personal interaction will impact how you feel about any given vineyard.

As we concluded our tasting at Grgich we started to ask for various recommendations from the guy who was helping us out. We were headed over to Sonoma for dinner, driving up and over the mountains between Napa Valley and Sonoma, so we needed a place that we could hit on the other side. He recommended we make a brief stop at Kunde Family Estate. It was getting to be a bit late in the day, so we'd really only have time for one more stop.

After the long and windy drive over the grade, the Kunde vineyard estate is nearby in the scenic hills of Sonoma county. Sticking with our Bottle Shock theme from earlier, it turns out that nearly all vineyard scenes from the movie were filmed in the hills of Kunde's massive estate. We were too late for one of their mountain top tastings, but I have to imagine the views are simply breathtaking. Even though we didn't get to experience their extensive grounds, their tasting room and patio areas were really quite nice.

The thing that's sort of fun about Napa Valley is that it's perfectly acceptable to begin drinking well before noon. As a result, our third day of wine country exploration started like the first, with an early morning tasting reservation at Nickel & Nickel.

I've been wanting to try this vineyard for some time now as they have what looks to be amazing grounds with a lot of history. They also have an old truck parked out front, and a couple of horses hanging out in the front fenced area, so it's just a very appealing approach to the winery.

Though the tour and tasting is a bit expensive, I think it's one that is worth it. The tour starts with a walk around the vineyard's house and barn property. The main house is an historic Queen Anne Victorian that's been restored quite nicely.

Beyond the home, the property is expansive and includes several new barn buildings for wine making.

As well as a reclaimed 18th century barn from the east coast that was moved and reconstructed on this site.

This barn is used as both the vineyard's wine lab and main offices. The day we were there they were setting up for an event.

The vineyard is farmed in an completely organic manner and the owners of the winery go to great lengths to ensure an extremely clean and green operation. They have acres of solar panels, extensive use of gray water systems, and use environmentally friendly approaches to production of all aspects of their wines (including corks and bottles). 

And they also have a pretty huge "cave" beneath one of the main production buildings.

After the tour we enjoyed a tasting of their wines and a few cheeses. The wine itself was a bit too expensive to bring a bottle home, but it was a fun experience and I'm glad we did it.

After Nickel & Nickel, we stopped by one of our favorite places, and a place that we tend to go back to every year we visit. Peju, in the Rutherford region, is a small production winery that you won't see on your grocery store shelves.

Wendy loves their wine and loves their vineyard scenery, so we always make a point to stop and enjoy it.

We also bought a few bottles at Peju for our shipping commitment. Oh, did I mention, by this point our 12 bottle decision had actually swelled just a little bit. Yes, we surpassed the 12 and then determined that 18 would be more appropriate. Yes, we felt 18 bottles were necessary given that we were buying one as a gift and one on request. Ok, 18 it was.

After Peju we stopped in at another new vineyard called Turnbull. Turnbull had come highly recommended by several locals so we figured it was worth a try and we actually enjoyed it quite a bit.

If you've never been to wine country or participated in several tastings back to back to back, let me tell you, you'll tire of it before long. By the third day Wendy and I are solidly in the, "Can we split this tasting?" mode. We'll belly up and just share each small glass. There's no shame in it, especially when you are driving from place to place. I'm typically the driver, so I'll swirl, sniff, swirl, sniff, and then take just a small taste. Wendy will do the honors and finish off the rest of the pour. We're a good team this way, and it works out quite nicely.

After our stop at Turnbull, we headed over to two of our favorite vineyards to round out our purchases. We stopped at Cakebread Cellars and also back at Sequoia Grove and filled out the remainder of our open spots in our shipping container. So our goal was to buy 6... no wait 12... no wait 18 bottles of wine to ship home. We went back to our hotel and assessed out purchases so that we could ship them home. Here's our loot.

Did you count it? Yep, that's 19 bottles. Nope, not 18, definitely 19. I have no idea how we made this critical calculation mistake. Luckily, one of the bottles was a smaller bottle of port, so we decided to risk it and pack that in our suitcase. When we got home last night and opened our luggage, I was quite happy to see that the bottle was intact and not leaking. Nothing spoils a trip more than wine all over your clothes.

In all we had an absolutely wonderful time. It made for a birthday celebration to remember, and will leave quite a lasting impression for future birthdays to live up to. If you're looking for a wonderful and relaxing place to spend a birthday, or even just for a nice vacation just because, Napa Valley comes highly recommended from the two of us. Though we're not locals to the area, I hope our suggestions can come in handy for you at some point.

Have you ever been to Napa Valley? Anything you particularly enjoyed that we should include on our next trip? If you've never been, do you have any desire to go? I'm always interested to see the opinion of other people. Back before I went the first time, I didn't see the attraction, but now that we've gone quite a bit, I'm completely sold!

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• The Perfect Napa Valley Vacation Itinerary
• Old Town Alexandria is Starting to Look Like Napa 

Well, we're back at it, but this time we're doing it in the name of the Pinterest Challenge.

If you're not familiar, the Pinterest Challenge is being hosted by Sherri & John at Young House Love, Katie at BowerPower, Erin at Hi Sugarplum, and Cassie at the Great Indoors. The goal is simple -- take something you've pinned that you find inspirational, do your own version, and put your own spin on it. Easy enough, right? Well, have you see how many cool and inspirational things there are on Pinterest? Just picking one thing to make might actually be the hardest thing about the challenge. 

Over the past few months I've been pinning things with a wine bar/wine country feel to it on a pin board called "Cheers". (If you're not already following us on Pinterest, what are you waiting for? We have a ton of cool stuff we've shared.) It's my dream to have a functional and cool wine bar to entertain people and share a little wine with some friends. During my Pinterest perusing, one of the things that repeatedly caught my eye was the creative use of empty wine bottles.

Link to original Pin

In my opinion, wine bottles are quite elegant as far as containers go. Their shape, color, size, and look evoke memories of vacations, celebrations, fun times of the past, and good times to come. But after they're spent, I always feel a little bad throwing them in the recycling bin, especially the special bottles whose corks were popped for celebratory reasons.

Link to original Pin

Though I absolutely loved the bottles I saw on Pinterest, and love love love the majority of the things in the Napa Style catalog (and I also love chef Michael Chiarello, but that's a different story), there were two major issues. The following pinned photo is originally from the catalog pages of Napa Style.

Link to original Pin

The first, size. The bottles Napa Style is selling start at the three liter sizes and go all the way up to six liters. Six! Our house is tiny, I can't imagine where a giant bottle like that would even fit without looking ridiculous.

The second issue is price. Starting at $99 and topping out at $249, these bottles, though very pretty, are well outside of my price range for used bottles. Call me crazy, but my preference on price is "free" or perhaps $0.05 cents in Michigan.

Rather than order large and expensive bottles, we set out to turn a few of our own smaller wine bottles into creative candle holders that could adorn our future wine bar or our outside entertaining area.

We started our project with two bottles, one standard 750ml wine bottle and one 750ml sparkling wine (champagne style) bottle. The goal was simple -- cut the bottom of the bottle off without shattering it into pieces and maiming ourselves. Though the bottles were full, we took it upon ourselves to drink them...in the name and spirit of the Pinterest Challenge. 

We had seen methods to cut bottles that included everything from scoring the bottles with a glass cutter to heating them with a blow torch and dipping them into a cold bucket of water, but all seemed less than exact and a little dangerous. For our project we decided to give the good ole wet saw a try. We did quite a bit of looking online but couldn't find definitive proof that a wet saw would do the job we wanted it to, so we figured we should figure it for ourselves.

The fist step was to set the fence on the wet saw to give us a good guide to rest the bottom of the bottle on. Our approach was to begin cutting the bottle and then slowly rotate it into the blade. The blade would take a little bit at a time from the bottle until it just dropped off...or at least that was the plan. 

I love it when a plan comes together. It was a success, and at long last, here's the actual video evidence that it is possible to use a standard wet tile saw to cut a glass wine bottle.

I hope it goes without saying, but be sure to wear your eye protection when working with tools like this.

As you can see, you just need to take it slowly, rotate the bottle as evenly as possible, and you can easily remove the bottom from a wine bottle. Once the bottom is cut free, there's going to be a good amount of glass residue still inside the bottle. Using a bucket of water, simply rinse out the inside of the bottle so you don't end up getting any glass pieces on your hands.

Because of the shape of the bottle there was a small bit of a glass bump left on the cut line. We used a tile file to shave it down a bit and were left with a nice and smooth cut line that wasn't sharp or dangerous.

Next we let the bottles soak in the bucket of water in order to loosen the labels. 

After a quick wash and thorough dry, we were in business. 

With our bottles ready, we set them on our dining room buffet with small candles.

We breathed a sigh of relief, figuring that the hard part was over and now all we had to do is set the bottles over the candles.

Wait a second, not so fast.

After lighting the candles and putting the bottles over them we hit our first small speed bump with the project. To this point we've only seen this type of thing with much larger format bottles, like the 3+ liter bottles. It seems the necks on the large format bottles are large enough to let the heat of the flames out while allowing fresh air in for the flame (remember, fire needs oxygen). However, these 750ml bottles have a bit more difficult time letting the candle breathe, causing the flame to go out after about 30 seconds.

We solved this by allowing the back of the bottle to sit just off of a coaster it was sitting on, allowing air to circulate. Once this was done the candles stayed lit without issue. I also think this will work well on our slatted outdoor table, or in a garden where the ground the bottle is sitting on is uneven.

You don't need much of an air gap at all to make it work. Making a quick and easy base with two pieces of 1/4" thick wood will also solve the problem. It would elevate the bottle enough and allow air in between the two pieces of material.

These bottles will also make excellent candle holders outdoors on breezy nights, the flame fully protected from the weather to ensure it won't go out. 

One final step we took to put our little twist on the project was to personalize the bottles using a Posterpaint Sharpie. Depending on the occasion, you could write a message on the bottles.

These can be anything from wine inspired greetings to a note about a celebration associated with the given bottle. You can use them to denote what is being served from a table, as seating cards, or just as a way to spice up a gathering. And best of all, you can wipe the messages off and alter them to your heart's content.

So there you have it, our Pinterest and Napa Style inspired "wine bottle candle holders." Overall, a project that was not too difficult, quite inexpensive (I'll actually go ahead and say "Free" since we already had all items on hand), and one that will work well for a variety of events and settings. I just can't wait until the weather starts to get nice and we can have people over for a wine evening in our garden. Maybe we'll make a large collection of these candle holders in various sizes and colors and decorate our back yard and patio with them. I'm not sure what I like better, the end result or the journey to consume the necessary amount of wine to make the project a reality.  

And in case you're wondering, the wet saw does a pretty good job of cutting, but it doesn't leave a nice and finished edge (at least not with our blade). So you really couldn't use it to create wine bottle drinking glasses without a bit of grinding and polishing.

So what do you think of our wine bottle candle holders? Not too shabby of a little project. And best of all, we're reusing something that would otherwise be a recyclable! 

Are you currently inspired by anything on Pinterest that you absolutely need to try for yourself? Maybe you're even taking part in this very same Pinterest Challenge? Share some of your ideas and likes with us, we'd love to see what you're working on.

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