UPPER LAKE, Calif. – Lake County Wine Studio will host a wine release party with Andy Pestoni of Jelly Jar Wines on Sunday, June 26, from 2 to 5 p.m.
 
The $10/per person (complimentary for Wine Studio club members) wine sampler and appetizers will showcase Jelly Jar Hearsay White Blend (Semillon, Sauvignon Blanc and Muscat), Rosé and Old Vine Zinfandel.

Andy Pestoni is a fourth generation winemaker whose great-grandfather, Albino Pestoni, came from Italy with his family and settled in St. Helena in the late 1890s.

Making wine was part of their heritage. Backyard vineyards were planted and family members were enlisted to harvest and crush grapes. They crafted food-friendly wines to enjoy around the family table – most often out of jelly jars.

Pestoni worked harvests at Beaulieu Vineyard while attending college and then went on to work in the cellar at Ferrari-Carrano in Sonoma County for several years.

When his father and uncle bought a winery in the town of Rutherford they asked Pestoni to join them to launch their new family winery. Pestoni has been the winemaker at Rutherford Grove Winery & Vineyards since 1996.

In 2005, Pestoni and his wife Shannon founded Jelly Jar Wines, a family endeavor marking a return to early California winemaking and their family heritage, and together they handle every aspect of production from start to finish.

Jelly Jar Wines are made with Lake County wine grapes from single vineyard sites Pestoni has personally chosen for their unique character, which he crafts into food-friendly wines to be enjoyed with family and friends.

The Lake County Wine Studio is located at 9505 Main St. in Upper Lake, telephone 707-275-8030.

HIDDEN VALLEY LAKE, Calif. – The Hidden Valley Lake Ladies 40-9ers Golf Club held a flag tournament on June 9.

The results are as follows:

– Flight 1, first place, Joy Ryan, net 32; second place, Bonnie Eagleton, 36.

– Flight 2, first place, Mariana Bendinelli, 35; second place, Elaine Fauser, 44.

– Flight 3, first place, Liz Cummesky, 35; second place, Toni Stratton, 37; third place, Gwen DeRosa, 39.

– Flight 4, first place, Linda Millard, 39; second place, Denyse McCracken, 45; third place, Babara Carver, 46.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The nonprofit Konocti Rod and Gun Club has announced its latest scholarship winners.

The group has awarded scholarships to graduating high school seniors since 2005.

The program began with two $250 awards, and awarded amounts increased as the club’s membership grew.

This year's scholarship winners are Rachel N. Kelley from Clear Lake High School, $1,000; Madelyn M. Copas from Konocti Education Center, $1,000; and Wyatt R. Jones from Middletown High School, who received the $250 Reggie Dencan Memorial Scholarship.

Curtis, Tina and Tenae Stewart would like to take this opportunity to thank all the good people of Lake County who supported our family and businesses for 23-plus years.

The Valley fire took it all from us.

We have all relocated to Sonoma County to be close to family, sold our property and sold Middletown Florist & Gifts, now the new owners can make new memories.

Not everyone is on Facebook and we feel we have left a lot of wonderful friends in the dark and we want to let them know we are OK, moving forward with life and making new memories, too.

If anyone would like to get in contact with us our new mailing address is P.O. Box 3952, Santa Rosa CA  95402.

Time heals – joy returns … ever so slowly.

Tina Stewart lives in Santa Rosa, Calif.

This past autumn, pruning a big lilac bush, I found a snakeskin that some bird had woven into its nest.

Here's a poem about another find, from Stephen Behrendt, who lives and teaches in Nebraska. His most recent book is Refractions, from Shechem Press.

Snakeskin

Pruning back the old spirea bushes
that sprawled for years in summer's heat,
I bared the snake skin, a yard and a half long:
its naked empty length rippled in the streaming wind
lifting its ghostly coils from the dead shoots
that scraped the slough from the slithering body
that shed it in that narrow, shaded space.

I paused—who wouldn't?—shears poised,
slipped off gray canvas gloves, extracted
the sere, striated casing from the brown stalks
that had held it, silent, hidden.

I coiled the paper-thin curling sheath with care,
delicately, eased it into a simple squatty box
for keeping, for care, for my daughters
to take to school, to show, to explain
how some sinuous body we've never glimpsed,
that haunts about our shrubs, our porch,
left for us this translucent, scale-scored wrapper,
this silent hint of all that moves unseen.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. They do not accept unsolicited submissions. Poem copyright ©2014 by Stephen C. Behrendt, “Snakeskin,” (Refractions, Shechem Press, 2014). Poem reprinted by permission of Stephen C. Behrendt and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2016 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Esther Siegel of Redwood Valley will be inducted into a special group of senior dressage riders and horses on Saturday, June 25, at the Lake County Summer Dressage Show at Highland Springs Equestrian Center in Kelseyville.

The ages of Siegel and her horse, Harmony, qualify them to become members of The Dressage Foundation's Century Club.

The Century Club recognizes dressage riders and horses whose combined ages total 100 years or more.

Siegel is 65 and Harmony is 35.

In addition to having ages totaling 100 or more, horse and rider perform a dressage test of any level at a dressage show and are scored by a dressage judge.

The Dressage Foundation provides a Century Club ribbon and wall plaque to each horse and rider team. Local dressage clubs, family and friends help to make the ride into a celebratory event.

The Century Club was formed at The Dressage Foundation in 1996, at the suggestion of noted dressage judge and instructor, Dr. Max Gahwyler. The intent was to encourage older dressage riders to remain active in the sport.

Since that time, the Century Club has grown into a meaningful and popular endeavor and has more than 220 members to date.

Dressage is a word drawn from the French verb for “to train.” Dressage is both a method of training horses and a competitive sport, and is designed to develop correct movement in the horse.

TDF's Century Club is sponsored by Platinum Performance. Visit www.platinumperformance.com/equine for more information.

For more information about The Dressage Foundation or the Century Club, please contact Jenny Johnson, executive director at 402-434-8585 or visit www.dressagefoundation.org .

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) Shared Habitat Alliance for Recreational Enhancement (SHARE) program is now taking applications for 37 elk hunting opportunities.

The hunts will take place Aug. 15 through Dec. 13 on 21 properties in Colusa, Del Norte, Humboldt, Mendocino and Siskiyou counties. Applications will be on sale from Friday, June 17 through Monday, July 25.
 
Fifteen of the 21 properties are new additions to the SHARE Program, which partners with private landowners to provide additional hunting, fishing and recreational opportunities for the public.

Participating landowners receive liability protection and compensation for providing public access to or through their land for wildlife-dependent recreational activities.

More information about the SHARE program, including specifics for the upcoming  elk hunts, can be found at www.wildlife.ca.gov/hunting/share .
 
All elk tags will be distributed through a random draw process. These hunts are in addition to those issued through the big game drawing and no preference points will be considered or used.

Applications can be purchased by anyone with a valid California hunting license from any CDFW license office or online at www.ca.wildlifelicense.com/internetsales .
 
An $11.37 nonrefundable application fee will be charged for each hunt application. Successful applicants will be notified on July 29.
 
Hunters are reminded it is legal to take only one elk in California per year.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson’s (CA-5) bipartisan provision requiring every American flag purchased by the Department of Defense (DOD) to be 100 percent manufactured in the United States, from articles, materials or supplies that are 100 percent grown, produced or manufactured in the United States, was passed by the House of Representatives on Thursday.

Thompson's provision passed as part of H.R. 5293, the DOD Appropriations Act of 2017.

The provision previously passed in the last Congress as part of H.R. 3547, the Fiscal Year (FY) 2014 consolidated appropriations bill, was signed into law by the president in January 2014, and was implemented by the Pentagon in 2015.

Thompson again introduced this provision to ensure its continued inclusion in DOD appropriations.

“I am proud to continue my efforts to ensure that every American flag the DOD buys is made in America, by American workers and with American products,” said Thompson. “This provision is commonsense. The brave men and women who serve our country in uniform should do so under an American-made flag.”

Specifically, Thompson's provision applies the Berry Amendment to the American flag.

The Berry Amendment, originally passed in 1941, prohibits DOD funds from being used to acquire food, clothing, military uniforms, fabrics, stainless steel and hand or measuring tools that are not grown or produced in the United States, except in rare exceptions.

Thompson's provision applies the same rules for the DOD's acquisition of American flags, which previously were not listed as a covered item.

Precedent already exists for such a provision. Currently, the Department of Veterans Affairs is required to only purchase U.S.-made American flags for servicemembers' funerals.

H.R. 5293 passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 282-138. The legislation will now go to the Senate for consideration.

Thompson represents California’s Fifth Congressional District, which includes all or part of Contra Costa, Lake, Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties.