A Vineyard Picnic with Joseph Jewell Wines And IfOnly

With everyone’s differing schedules, it’s hard to gather a group of 4 twenty-somethings together for a whole day in wine country, so when the weather called for buckets of rain in Sonoma Valley, we didn’t want to cancel on our picnic plans with Joseph Jewell, booked through IfOnly. A little rain never hurt nobody! 

The rarest thing in life is to live. Most people simply exist – Oscar Wilde

With this quote in mind, on a rainy Saturday morning we all met at my place (umbrellas in hand!) and headed north to wine country. Thankfully, not a lot of other people are trying to get to Sonoma when it’s pouring rain, so we arrived just before noon at the Joseph Jewell tasting room in Forestville. We met our luminary, Adrian, one of the vintners, picked up some bottles of wine and a picnic basket, and headed to Floodgate Vineyards for a cozy picnic among the vines. 

By this point, the rain had halted to a mere drizzle and the hardest part of the day was just walking through the mud while holding up our dresses. Some people got dirtier than others (looking at you, Zoha!). We walked through the vineyard with Adrian to a quaint canopy he had prepared over a picnic table under a beautiful oak tree. The table was arranged with a farm-to-table picnic and two bottles of Joseph Jewell wines. After some photos of the scenery (and the food, because hey, we’re bloggers), we started popping bottles and digging in. All of the food was prepared by a caterer who happen to live really close by. Adrian pointed to some hills and told us she lives there, and that she even picked the greens making up our salad from her garden. 

What’s so special about this experience is we got to sip on wine made from vines growing just 10 feet away from us while the winemaker himself talked about his craft and the blend we were drinking. If that’s not living, I don’t know what is. 

That’s why I loved pairing up with IfOnly to partake in this experience and share it with you all. It’s so easy to get caught up in life, get stuck in a routine and forget to live life. Heck, there was a few minutes when I thought about rescheduling this day because I didn’t think it would go well due to the weather! And then a friend pointed out that it’s really hard to have a bad time in wine country, and despite the drizzle, our afternoon under that oak tree ranks in my top visits up north. I’ll forever remember Zoha borrowing my boots to walk through the mud, Gen holding up her umbrella under the canopy because the one big hole in the tent was near her and Justina passing out the second we got into the car (both ways!).  

IfOnly is a company that specializes in helping you live life to the max while giving back to the community. From private cooking classes with a San Francisco personal chef, to hot air balloon rides in Napa Valley to picnics in vineyards, IfOnly has everything for original, luxury, memory-making days. And the best icing on the cake? A portion of every experience you do goes to charity. Adrian’s charity is Alex’s Lemonade Stand, a group that support cancer research, specifically research for childhood cancer. (That’s what their tagline “Experiences For Good” means, in case you were wondering!) Giving to others while experiencing life-long memories is a win-win in my book. Want to be a luminary and host your own experiences? GO HERE and use access code WHIMSYSOUL. 

If you are looking for fun things to do in San Francisco (or New York and LA areas) please PLEASE check out IfOnly next time you have a free weekend. (I’m eying a seaplane flight around San Francisco. Those aerial views must be amazing! Maybe for my birthday this fall?) Use code WHIMSYSOUL (valid through June 2016) for $50 off your first experience! 

To bring this story back to the beginning, I think our day in Sonoma would make Oscar Wilde proud.