Friday, April 24, 2009

Best Denny's in the World



(Click on image to enlarge) The best Denny's in the world--right here in Kennydale. The "mimosa's" (ask for peach--their specialty) are perfect on a warm spring Sunday morning. Chocolate cake shots, however, are really not my thing.

Kennydale--ahead of the "s" curve!

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Honesty


Yes, they're weeds, but they're so damn beautiful and healthy!

Lost in the Dandelions


Visiting Lake Sammamish State Park yesterday really put dandelions in perspective for me. Here were masses and masses of the very flowers I had spent the weekend savagely beheading and pulling up by their roots. Here at the park they cover everything with their yellowness--from a distance you're looking at a huge carpet of gold.

By the way, this shot was taken seconds before I got busted by a park ranger for having Stella off her leash. I found myself on the losing end of a philosophical discussion. But Stella certainly thought it was worth it!

Community Meeting Update

An entry I drafted but didn't post last April:



At a group discussion held back in January at the Mustard Seed about the future of our neighborhood center, the subject of "Third Place" came up. The City talks about neighborhood "identifiers," "focal points" and signage, but we find ourselves talking about a sense of the place. What we want in a neighborhood.

The city can give us synthetic turf for our neighborhood park, they can give us a whiz-bang new development with rowhousing on our main street but the sense of community we'll have to create for ourselves.

I sensed some frustration at the Community Club meeting tonight. We've had four monthly meetings this year and one special hugely-attended meeting specifically about the Red Apple closure. It looks like, in this economic climate, the store will be closed for quite some time. On the other hand, there is so much opportunity to bring the community together--just look at all that asphalt.

On the way to more third places, during that two, or three, or four year period when plans get made, permits are arranged, bids are accepted, designs are drawn up...meetings and more meetings are held...let's focus on what we can do to bring the community together and use that time to strengthen our ties to one another.



The City Parks Department held a meeting last week to:
"Join us as we share sportsfield improvements plans for Newport Hills Community Park as part of the voter approved Parks levy."

Seems innocuous, but the important words here are Community Park. Not a neighborhood park but a community park. A definition is in order here: a community park serves the needs of the community at large; in this case, the eastside soccer community. By any definition, this is a neighborhood park. It's tiny--just big enough for a grassy field and a cramped little playground.

What is missing in this invitation are the words "synthetic turf." Because that is all that got talked about at the ensuing meeting.

The thing is that the City, with 1.8 million dollars in their pocket to spend on Newport Hills park improvements, chose to spend it on the installation of synthetic turf. This was presented as a "done deal" because the City has no other options for siting a community soccer field in existing neighborhoods. Guess why not. People don't want them in their neighborhood.

Now at Surrey Downs and Eastgate neighborhoods, when this levy was approved, expansions at Surrey Downs include open lawns, picnic spots and a skateboarding area. A "development zone" has been reserved to allow for a community center. The process takes about 18 months, according to "Bellevue: It's Your City June 2009". Over at Eastgate, an off-leash dog area, picnic facilities and trails will be on offer in addition to the possibility of lighted sportsfields and an indoor recreation building. The City purchased properties from the Boeing Co and the BSD, which is interesting because we were told at the meeting that The City isn't in the business of land acquisition.

Understandably, the meeting was heated. After all, Newport Hills is practically dying on the vine and all the City can offer for their 1.8 mil is some astroturf and a guarantee of late bedtimes for the neighborhood kids who can't get to sleep because of the year-round usage of the park til 10:30 at night, fully lit and noisy.

Apparently you can't walk your dog on the stuff, eat on it, put stakes in it for fairs, etc., and, according to recent studies, it's not good for your kids' health:

Bellevue food challenge II

Here it is. Menu for one week. I'm also wheat-free.
But is it $7.00 a day? Which according to the challenge is what a person receives on food stamps. Very roughly I could live on under $6.50 a day, shopping at Trader Joe's and PCC/Whole Foods (for meat)

Breakfast appx. 1.50 per day
Steel cut oatmeal 2.99 (21 servings total)
Walnuts 4.29
Dried cranberries 2.99
lil bit of milk, brown sugar

Lunch appx. 1.00-1.50 per day
brown rice 3.99
tofu 1.19
greens 2.29
lil bit of soy sauce

Dinner appx. 3.56 per day
steamed greens 2.29
lil bit of chicken or beef 6.59, 4.95
polenta, quinoa or corn tortilla 3.99, 2.99
or
refried bean burritos 1.09, 2.99

Total: 6.31 per day

Plus some extras listed below which I haven't figured out how to work into the total. I'm still working on that part.

Shared Drinks
tea
half n half 1.49
Simpler Times lager (6 cans) 3.99
Hogue fume blanc 6.99

Shared Condiments
lt sour cream 1.49
hummus dip 2.19
yogurt 2.99
salsa 3.29
olive oil

Shared Fruit and Veg (appx $5.00 per person/71 cents per day)
3 lb apples 2.99
large yogurt 2.99
peppers 2.99
sugarplum tomatoes 2.99
snow peas 2.19
lemons 1.29
romaine hearts 1.99

Monday, April 20, 2009

Kristen's flowers



Hugs and a huge shout-out to Kristen for the beautiful flowers

Cruisin at sunset

A teen's view of Newport Hills and the greater Coal Creek environs:












Graffiti at the Red Apple


Sunday, April 19, 2009

New Dominion


Another empty big box near the Chuck E Cheese on 148th.
I parked in front of a puff ball centurion, tiny starlings flitting between the shrubs standing guard over their new dominion. Mwha ha ha!

Keepin it Real


In one of my earliest blog entries I teased a bit about how proud the local bank was to be introducing drive up windows in 2005. Even in 2009, they're still proud. Shortly after that the sign, prominently displayed on the most visible intersection in the community, came down. They turned off the lights on one of the three drive-up windows. To this day, I have never seen a single car pull up to any of the windows.

I mention this because in the current climate of bailouts and corporate greed, there's something very real about the state of our local bank. A slight out-of-touchness that I find oddly touching.

Double-click on the picture below to enlarge for full effect:

Saturday, April 18, 2009

More Neighborhood Shops




A few weekends ago we tried to follow a tip that there were some right-size shops on the south end of Mercer Island. South end of Mercer Island, you say? But that's where Paul Allen and loads of other Microsoft billionaires live in semi-seclusion with moorage for their yachts and splendid views of Mt Rainier. How would they ever allow a QFC or Rite-Aid in their neighborhood? I had forgotten the golden rule of suburban shopping centers: follow the puffballs! The QFC couldn't be far away!



Well, we got very lost and swore up and down that there was no such thing. We stopped at the library book sale, a small but very good one, I might add...and the helpful librarians directed us right to it. We'd only passed it a gazillion times and not seen it. That's the clue. It is very well camouflaged. Only the locals know it's there.


A wall separates it from the adjacent houses and disguises the corral for dumpsters. The mailboxes are located in a kiosk near the entry.

Note the highly visible pathways in the parking lot.





Boy is it tasteful. Beige and blue. Unassuming. But it works for the neighborhood. Like Newport Hills it has a Sahara Pizza and a teriyaki place.







The Starbucks has a truly cozy, inviting outdoor place to sit complete with picnic tables and fireplace.









Between the shops are courtyard-like places to sit in the sun amidst the well-manicured shrubs and pathways which allow you to visit the shops without criss-crossing the parking lot. Regular maintenance gives you the feeling the people who use this center care about it.











Punch-bug


Just because I've been indulging my taste for odd plants doesn't mean I've forgotten something much more important: the weekly bugwatch. It is still there, dependable as Old Faithful. One wants to decorate it in seasonal finery, like they do the Waiting for the Interurban sculpture in Fremont. Come on Newport Hills teens--where's your spirit? A little red and gold on the true blue?

If you play "punch bug" with your loved ones, might I suggest driving past Stod's several times a day, as I do? It's good fun to plant a playful punch everytime you see the blue bug...my children are quite black and blue by now, and thoroughly sick of the game. They call it cheating, but I'm the mom and I call it anything I like.

(Sorry about that last paragraph. I was channelling Jack Handey and some of you out there might not get the joke. My apologies if you're offended by sick humor.)

Friday, April 17, 2009

Skunk Cabbage





Staying with the jack-in-the-pulpit theme: when I was growing up in Eugene, Oregon, we'd pass a sign for Darlingtonia Botanical Wayside on the way to the coast. If we stopped there I don't remember it, but I have been back as an adult. Perhaps the pitcher plants (Darlingtonia californica) that grow there stayed on in my subconscious and that's what draws me to the Arisaema cobra lilies that I wrote about yesterday. Another reason they may be muddled up in my mind is that darlingtonia is also known as cobra lily. And it's easy to see why.







It always seemed so strange that an entire wayside would be devoted to these stinky, carnivorous plants that drew flies and shine ghostlike in the filtered light with an acid lemon glow. Hence the nick-name "swamp lantern." Now I discover that it is Oregon's largest single-species preserve and I feel a connection to the folks who had the foresight many decades ago to cherish the botanical beasties.

According to Tryon Community Farm, its root and rhizome contain a useful expectorant
good for treating cases of whooping cough, asthma, and bronchitis; also taken for upper respiratory problems such as nasal congestion and hay fever; less commonly it is used in the treatment of epilepsy, headaches, vertigo, and rheumatic problems and as a means to stop bleeding.

And now I also see that there are two distinctly different kinds of skunk cabbage: Lysichiton americanus and Symplocarpus foetidus. I've wandered into a swamp of botanical confusion. Now it's clear: Lysichiton americanus is western skunk cabbage and Symplocarpus foetidus is eastern skunk cabbage. The latter bears a very strange fruit indeed. Well, doesn't anything with "fetid" in its name?





I'm still searching for the missing link between the cobra lily forms above to the yellow flowers--they are both darlingtonia californica but how this fits with the eastern and western skunk cabbage I'm still waiting to find out.

All this springtime swamp-tromping has led me to a wonderful blog from Carnation:
here

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Cobra Lilies

From the 2009 Great Plant Picks folks here are five jack-in-the-pulpits (Arisaema) worth having in your garden...I am utterly amazed because I can't find arisaema of any kind in the Sunset Western Garden Book. I've always been fascinated by these woodland dwellers and would be happy to have any one of these make a home in my garden:

A. sikokianum


A. ringens


A. consanguineum




A. triphyllum

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Hooray for trilliums


This is the time of year to spot trilliums on Cougar Mountain, our neighborhood's backyard. They seem to like to hide, which extends that Easter egg-hunting lust for another couple weeks.

Today I want to introduce you to my trillium hero, Ervin Nalos, who is pictured on the front page of this morning's Bellevue Reporter. His trilliums are nothing like the shy shadowy figures from Cougar--those in the photo are tall, thick-stemmed and downright brazen. According to the article he estimates he has 600 blooms total which he's been cultivating and dividing for nearly 50 years. Take a bow, Ervin!

The photos here are mine, and until I saw Ervin's beauties I was quite proud of my attempts at capturing the ephemeral beauty of trillium ovatum also known as wakerobin.


Here you can see another favorite of mine, the wild bleeding heart which is in bloom in my garden this week and looks best when nestled alongside a thicket of trillium. The fiddlehead ferns are also starting to shake off their wintry brown coats.


Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Signs of Spring

Despite yesterday's hailstorm, a sure sign of spring in Newport Hills is the raising of the red and white tent over Newcastle Fruit and Produce. Welcome back, friends!


Sunday, April 12, 2009

Re pple




Eastside Catholic (recently abandoned and vandalized) has acquired a lovely fence for another year until Bellevue School District moves in the first of several temporary schools while their home schools are being remodeled. Tyee Middle School will be the first, but the BSD has decided to postpone construction for another year.

We really hope this isn't what the owners decide to do with Red Apple, which has recently been showing signs of neglect when both the small d and large A burned out:

"Re pple"

Bellevue Blog and Food Challenge







Here's a blog I discovered this week, written by Bellevue resident/Israel native Nurit Asnash:


http://www.familyfriendlyfood.com/

Professional in a way I can only dream about, it contains lots of recipes in an extremely user-friendly format. I am curious to see how she responds to the United Way of King County challenge to create meals for a family of four on 22.00 per day. This is the average amount of food a family is given when using the services of the local food bank, according to Bellevue Reporter.

Her children are 1 and 5, and mine are teen and tween, so I think if I take the challenge it will be, well, more of a challenge. We'll see..


Find more information on the challenge here: http://www.uwkc.org/


And to view the recipe for the fabulous dessert that made me take notice in the first place, feast your eyes here:


http://www.gourmet.com/recipes/2000s/2009/04/pavlova-with-lemon-curd-and-berries