1st Annual Guthrie-Scholin Spring Wine Festival 2013

Phil and I had our first date at the 2012 Spring Wine Festival in Skopje. This year, we were unable to go to the 2013 Spring Wine Festival, so we decided to have our own wine festival and have decided to make this a yearly event (next year, we might even invite guests, depending on where in the world we are and if we have any friends!).

Without further ado, here is the 1st Annual Guthrie-School Spring Wine Festival- 2013, held in Shtip, Macedonia.

He might hate me for uploading this, but one of the most memorable moments of the 2012 Wine Festival, and the whole reason we went there, in fact, was that the 7:00pm bus was full, so we had to take the very last bus to Shtip- the 8:37 Strumica Express Komvi. Phil decided to make this a part of our 2013 event and turned himself into a Strumica Express komvi complete with a driver who was talking on his phone, smoking a cigarette (fake), and blaring turbo-folk music. His creativity is one of the many things I love about him!

We each had the job of buying some wine. Note- we did NOT drink it all. As an entrance fee into the 2012 Wine Fest, you had to buy your glasses, so Phil and I have nice glasses with the logo on it. This year, I thought I would surprise Phil with making us some glasses to commemorate this year's event. Well, with only about 1 hour and limited supplies (white nail polish), I had a few struggles. I spent the first 55 minutes trying to draw and cut out a template of the poster logo out of tape to stick on the glasses. Then I was going to paint over with the nail polish. FAIL. We ended up with glasses that just say "WINE" in big letters and the date on the base. I was quite frustrated they weren't perfect, but in the end, they are far more "Peace Corps-ish" this way.

The wine selection: A very nice Vranec from Bovin Winery in Negotino (the expensive 450 mkd bottle), the cheapest bottled Vranec you can buy, a Cabernet Sauvignon made here in Shtip, a gross jug of white wine that was left by another PCV who is famous for her love of large jugs of wine, a new one to us- a Vranec and Merlot mix, and a Kavadarka- a PCV red wine staple as its only 99 mkd. Again, we did NOT drink all of this.

One of my goals for this next year is to do a better job of taking people pictures, not just pictures of scenery, etc. The smoke from the grill made it a little hard.

The wind decided to switch directions.

We grilled pork kebabs and potatoes.

They were delicious!

And ate part of this massive vegan strawberry and coconut cream chocolate layered cake I made.

 It was a great night and I can't wait to see what is in store for the 2nd Annual Guthrie-Scholin Spring Wine Festival in 2014.