Mom's 50th Celebration

My mom turned the big five-zero this past weekend and we all traveled to her new cabin to celebrate for the weekend. Mom, Adam, Chloe and I headed out Thursday to head up to Meadows of Dan where the mini-me cabin is located. We stopped on the way at a great New York pizza place in the middle of the country, very random, but delicious!We arrived at the cabin around 9pm (it's about a 5 hour drive from Virginia Beach) and it was pretty chilly upon arrival since we had to get the wood stove going to heat things up. So needless to say, that's why we hung out at the kitchen table close to the stove for a while when we first arrived. Then we watched a movie and relaxed away the rest of the evening. This was also Adam's first visit to Chateau Barker (the new cabin's name).
This is the pretty view I awoke to Friday morning, a beautiful fall day and blue blue skies.
After cooking a yummy breakfast Adam headed out to build our fire pit for the evening's entertainment.
Then we headed out for our afternoon explorations. We stopped at this little chapel up the road. It was built in the 1800s for monks and was recently uncovered and restored and it's right up the road from Chateau Barker.
Then we set out for a ride on the Blue Ridge Parkway in search of fall foliage. We definitely found some gorgeous views like this one. I love the contours of the mountains.
Next on the agenda was a stop at Chateau Morisette, one of the best vineyards in Virginia. We have loved their wine for years now since Cola introduced us all to Our Dog Blue more than ten years ago. The vineyard is extremely dog friendly, so Chloe was able to walk all around grounds with us and there are water bowls set out for the dogs too. She even went on the tour with us. These oak barrels cost 5 to 7 hundred dollars a barrel and they only get three to four years use out of them, which is three to four batches of wine because they age in the barrels for seven to ten months depending on the wine. I asked if the red coloring is the wine seeping through during the aging process, but it's just stains from wine being spilled on the barrels.

I think I have decided that out of all the Virginia vineyards I've visited and that's quite a few, Chateau Morisette is now my absolute favorite. There wasn't a single wine in the tasting that I did not like, which is pretty rare. My only qualm was that they make Hokie Wine, which I don't feel right drinking and I think they should make some for the Hoos too to be fair!This is the bottle my mom bought, Angel Chardonnay, because we all know she loved angels and the wine was tasty too and of course we bought a bottle of my favorite Our Dog Blue. An interesting fact about that wine is it was sold under a different name in a plain bottle and when the company changed the name to Our Dog Blue and made the bottle blue sales went up 600%! Just shows how much people like their pets! So the vineyard started naming all their wines after their family dogs like their red wine, The Black Dog.
Adam and I hanging out while dinner cooks just before the rest of the crowd arrived.

Dinner time! Everyone got there just in time for steaks, potatoes, corn and some fresh squash.

After dinner, Adam got the fire going out front and we all sat around the fire pit relaxing, telling ghost stories since it was Halloween and roasting smores. The funniest part of the evening was the fact that there seemed to be a hundred cows somewhere off in the distance mooing at the top of their lungs for hours. The sound had actually woken my mom up that morning and had continued throughout the day. We couldn't decide if it was cow mating season and or a forgotten round of milking. This remains a bit of a mystery!The next morning everyone got ready and we headed to breakfast at the famous Mayberry Mill restaurant. They have the best pancakes! I had a combination plate that included a sweet potato pancake, a cornmeal pancake and a buckwheat pancake. They were all yummy, but Adam and my favorite was the sweet potato pancake, so we ordered an extra one to share.
The afternoon was spent relaxing and making Chicken Chili, a cabin classic. Check out Aprons Required for the promised recipe.Anna and Will arrived soon after lunch was cooking. They had spent Friday night at Radford to celebrate Halloween College style. They dressed up as Rocky and Bowinkle. Cute!

Finally the Birthday finale had arrived! 50th Birthday Presents and a tasty Italian Dinner made by Chef Cola.

Some festive drink ware for the Martini Queeni and a Perfectly 50 year Aged wine glass.Mom had asked for an Ipod for her Birthday. So Brad got her the newest generation Ipod Nano and we bought a speaker system for the Ipod and Anna and Will got her Ipod covers.

Anna also got mom some cute pink items to go with the Ipod covers, like pink lotion to keep away aging skin and a pedegg to keep skin soft.

The birthday dinner consisted of homemade Caesar salad complete with homemade croutons followed by baked spaghetti with spaghetti sauce that had simmered all day long. Adam and I had to get on the road after dinner to be back in Virginia Beach at a decent hour so we could get up for church Sunday morning so we missed Birthday cake, but Brad had picked up a huge carrot cake for the occasion and I'm sure Cola will be posting more shots of that birthday moment on Inside Out.
HAPPY 50th BIRTHDAY MOM!
We were so excited to celebrate such a momentous occasion with you! We hope it was all you wanted and more!

2 comments:

Melin said...

Jessica and Adam, I just wanted to say THANK YOU for the most wonderful 50th birthday celebration, it was more than I could have ever imagined. I so loved being at our cabin celebrating this day with the people I love so very much, I will never forget it, the weather was perfect, the food was fabulous, and the wine was plentyful and out of this world. I am so happy that I got to spend some truly quality time with the people I love so much, you, Adam, Anna, Will, Brad, Cola and Denis, I will never forget this very special birthday, it is truly engraved in my mind forever. I love you, Momma

Bob Burgin said...

Jessica and Adam, thanks for making Chateau Morrisette part of the big weekend celebration! We tried to make a Woo wine, but the "big dogs" in C'ville declined. BTW, red wine is sometimes painted on the center section of the barrels. That way it will not matter if the wine is spilled during the filling or emptying process.

Bob
(EVP/GM of CM)

  © Blogger template Sunset by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP