The semi-decided upon color scheme for the events room... "Soft Brie" on three of the walls with one wall a painting technique, and "Champagne Bubbles" on the ceiling. Waiting for our chairs to arrive that we ordered for use at events! All of our chandeliers have arrived at the Echo Lighting showroom in Sioux Center, and we are extremely excited for them to be installed. We are about at that point where they can be installed in the events room!

Dry-wall installation has begun in the tasting room, which will eventually be covered up by pine planking. A relief that we don't have to paint this ceiling, however this means we are back to staining...

The guys installed our roll-up door to our cellar...

We have completed our quota of staining our siding!!! We have been staining since October, so this is an accomplishment. Will's mom came from central Iowa to help us out, and we got a lot done! As we finished up our siding, we were ordering more boards to stain for our ceiling in the Tasting Room.

Will began paining the ceiling with our "Champagne Bubbles" color in the events room. It's all in the name ;o).

Probably one of the most painful jobs we have done...

Ceiling complete. Next were the walls, which were fun compared to the ceiling. ;o) Didn't take long at all, Will sprayed while I went behind him with a roller for a nice even finish.

While we finished up the painting, Will's mom started up our next staining project... 900 pine boards for the ceiling in the tasting room. This is turning out to be quite different from staining our siding, which was a one step process, compared to sanding, applying a wood conditioner (let dry), apply the stain color (let dry), apply a coat of polyurethane (let dry), sand and apply another coat...  Currently finished with 200 boards, really looking forward to the next 700. ;o)

Will also started our East wall that we have chosen to do a painting technique to, called "moonlit weave".  Also a multi-step process, he started by spraying on the base coat, with me rolling behind him... This will be the wall that we will have the electric-roll-down screen (certainly not the technical term), for the projector.

After the base coat had dried, we applied a tinted "medium texture", with a "technique pad" in a 4'x4' area, then used a color washing brush to lightly drag the texture horizontally across the wall, then repeated that process until the wall was finished...

Sunset break...

Back to painting...

Will finished that night.

We received our tables and chairs we will be using for events! We have 38 60" round tables, 6 rectangular 8' tables, and 300 chairs for events that will take place in the Sky Room. The round tables can fit 6-8 guests, the rectangular 10 guests. We have our first private event booked the first weekend in May, and we are super excited!

All that needs to be finished in the Sky Room is staining and installation of the woodwork, staining of the concrete, and installation of the chandeliers, of which have all arrived that the Echo Lighting showroom in Sioux Center!

Tried four different colors: weathered bronze, black, walnut, and petina, in the basement to figure out what we will want to use in the Sky Room, Tasting Room, and Barrel Room. We still need to decide on what sealant coat to use, so we are open to any suggestions!

The guys finished with the siding on the North! Siding complete! They also finished with the beams on the South side of the tasting room...

Since the siding was finished, we could focus our attention to the pine planking for the tasting room. Using sheets of sand paper and sanding by hand, quickly progressed to electric palm sanders, making the process easier on the arm. We have learned it best to start the hardest way of doing things, then moving to a simplified way makes us much more appreciative of the whole process. ;o)

After a week of warm melting weather, we received rain, sleet, and now snow... Nearly an inch of ice has settled on the vineyard---while beautiful, we are hoping the wind doesn't come up and break off some of our vines!

Looking forward to warmer weather, sanding/staining, chandelier installation, and checking things off of our list of to-do's!

We recently tragically lost a most precious part of our family, our first addition, Little Man. Little Man came to us the week we got back from our honeymoon nearly four years ago when we moved to the desert. He was a blessing to our lives, helped us through some tough times, and is severely missed...

To our Little Man, we love you!