I love it when people talk about la robe of a wine; it’s one of my favorite faux amis. While they mean color, I’m seeing a dressing gown.
Which is exactly what we were up to on December 7th. Dressing the wine in pretty robes and hats and setting them in their carriages – the “garnet girls” were shipping out for their Debutante Party in Paris Wednesday night, our first official tasting.
We gathered the same team with their machine on wheels. Henri and Sonia catch the bottles as they emerge
and lay them in their boxes with a heavy duty cushion in the middle. 
From here they enter the sealing machine.
On the other side John and Christian are last on the little assembly line, pulling the cartons from the rolling belt and stacking them on pallets for shipment.
Once again it started to rain, and the cow pasture behind the winery turned into a field of mud. Henri surveyed the exit grimly – just last week the farmer had to tow our van out with his tractor. 
This time it took an hour and lots of shoulder grease to push the labeling machine up to the road.
Which lended a slightly victorious air to the morning’s work; the girls were standing poised, all dressed up, with a wonderful place to go.
