April 2009

The wind at Whitman Middle School picked up and carried seemingly any ball that was hit that day. It also carried away a Ballard High School offense that had averaged nearly 10 runs per game during a recent three-game stretch.

Newport handed the Ballard baseball team an 8-0 defeat, its third in a row, April 7. The Beavers were also shut out 4-0 in an April 4 make-up game against Bothell.

The team is now sitting at 4-5 overall and 3-4 in the conference while its offense has disappeared. In three games, from March 26 to April 3, Ballard scored 29 runs and went 2-1. They have not scored in the two games since.

It wasn't only the Ballard offense that struggled against Newport. After pitching three shutout innings and giving up only two hits, Ballard senior Jordy Donald gave up four hits, loaded the bases and walked in a run in the fourth inning.

Junior Ryan Garrett took over in the fourth for Donald with the bases loaded and no outs. He got out of it with a nifty second-first-home triple play, but Newport was on top 3-0.

Garrett would get beat up in the sixth inning, giving up five hits and four runs.

In response to increased costs to businesses as a result of a bill passed last year by the Seattle City Council prohibiting food service establishments from serving food in containers made of expanded polystyrene, council member Bruce Harrell is proposing buying co-op that would combine the collective purchasing power of local food service businesses to reduce the cost of compostable products.

Passed last July, the disposable bag fee legislation was created to reduce harm to the environment caused by plastic bags and other disposable products by decreasing the bulk of solid waste stored in the city’s landfills.  The legislation banned polystyrene containers as of Jan. 1 and requires food service businesses to use compostable products instead.  

Harrell, a member of the council’s housing and economic development committee, said he is concerned about the economic burden placed on food establishments by the shift to compostable products.  Some restaurant owners report that using compostable products has raised their container costs 35 to 40 percent.

In addition, increased costs are likely to be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.

Holy Rosary principal Kris Brown announced Monday that she will be leaving to lead St. Catherine School in Maple Leaf.

Brown has been at Holy Rosary for 25 years, teaching third and fourth grade her first two years and leading the school as principal for 23 years.

While the principal was not actively looking for a new job, the opportunity at St. Catherine intrigued her. The school is just two miles from Brown's home and half the size of Holy Rosary.

"It's been the hardest decision I've made in my life," said Brown. "But through change comes new life and new energy and I feel that for Holy Rosary and for myself."

Holy Rosary, a Catholic K-8 school, has grown and changed significantly under Brown's leadership. The student body has doubled with two classes at each grade level and the faculty has nearly tripled.

Holy Rosary's curriculum has also changed significantly. Brown worked to strengthen the school's technology program so that they now have a mobile computer lab with 30 laptop computers, smart boards in classrooms and online report cards that parents can easily access.

The past few days have been great, weather-wise, and seem even more special after the non-stop rain last week.

The rain was starting to get me down until I realized that the cherry blossom trees had bloomed to life. As I have learned during my time in Seattle, the cherry blossom trees are the signal that spring is here.

One of the things that takes some getting used to about living in the Pacific Northwest is the rain. While it is better that having snow all winter, the constant grey skies can get to you, especially after six straight months. There is a line from the movie “The Crow” that I always think of around this time of year: “It can’t rain all the time.”

I moved to Seattle one September and when I arrived the weather was perfect. My friend told me to enjoy it while it lasted so we went swimming in Lake Washington, hiked Tiger Mountain and went to a Mariners game. By the time I moved to Ballard, the rain had already started.

Hope Lutheran is seeing significant changes in both its physical building and its programming.

For the first time since Hope Lutheran first opened, the pre-school-through- eighth-grade school is able to house all of its classrooms in one building. Previously, preschool and kindergarten classrooms were off site. Now, the early childhood development classrooms are all located together in a new wing north of the building.

Other new facilities include a new music classroom, computer lab and a one-on-one classroom for special education therapy. Elevators have also been installed in the school to improve access.

In total, the school has added about half of its original space.

Inside Hope Lutheran Church, a congregation which is currently celebrating its 90th anniversary, new carpet and lighting has been installed in the church and the entranceway has been expanded to a much larger lobby.

Until recently, no major renovation work had been done in the school since it was built in the 1950s.

"The congregation was ready," said Adair Hinds, head of the school. "The church was going through a strategic planning process to unify the church and the school."

A new colony of Humboldt penguins was introduced yesterday for the first time to Woodland Park Zoo’s new penguin exhibit, which opens to the public on May 2.

The 20 tuxedoed birds waddled outdoors onto the beach and naturally did what penguins in the wild do, they went swimming.

The penguins, 10 males and 10 females, arrived three weeks ago from five other zoos and aquariums. As part of the zoo’s excellent animal care program for its animals and new arrivals, the penguins had been in quarantine in the interior enclosure of the new exhibit. The birds range in ages 1 to 20 years old and moved from Brookfield Zoo (Chicago), SeaWorld (San Diego), Rosamond Gifford Zoo (Syracuse, NY), Saint Louis Zoo and Aquarium of Niagara (Niagara Falls, NY).

First Student drivers and school buses will be collecting non-perishable foods and diapers for the White Center Food Bank on Saturday, April 25 from 10:30 am to 3:30 p.m. at the following stores:

• Burien Albertsons (12725 1st Ave. S.)

• QFC Westwood Village (2500 S.W. Barton St.)

• White Center Albertsons (10616 16th Ave. S.W.)

The most needed foods are Hamburger Helper and Rice-a-Roni type products as well as canned meat (not tuna), canned fruit, cereal and jelly. The White Center Food Bank serves a diverse ethnic population so ethnic foods are always welcome.

The food bank also accepts $5 and $10 gift cards from Safeway, QFC or Albertsons. Cash donations can be sent to the White Center Food Bank at 10829 8th Ave. S.W., Seattle, WA 98146.

To donate online click here.

These days, the teen fiction market enjoys an enormous audience. It seems some girls around school are never seen without a copy of "Twilight" clasped underneath their arm. And while teen fiction rakes in its share of revenue for the publishing houses, when compared to good adult fiction, the majority of teen fiction is often clichéd.

“If a student is capable of reading and comprehending adult fiction, he should definitely go ahead and try harder material,” said West Seattle High School Librarian Sarah Moges. “Challenge yourself.”

Teen fiction serves up the same story again and again in the hunt for the buck. Luckily for those tired of vampire romances and stale "Catcher in the Rye" copycats, there’s hope on the adult-fiction rack.

For the suspense-lover, bestselling authors John Grisham and Stephen King write guaranteed delights that you will enjoy many times over.

John Grisham’s 2008 novel "The Appeal" is a courtroom drama that tells of a multi-billionaire chemical plant dumping toxic waste into a neighboring town’s water supply.

Residents crowded the March 25 Northwest District Council meeting to make the case for more than a dozen projects that qualify for the Seattle Neighborhood Projects Fund.

The district council ranked the top five projects this week for the Seattle Department of Transportation to evaluate. The council also named two backup projects.

Four of these projects could affect the greater Ballard neighborhood.

One of the prioritized projects is to install a speed bump, stop sign or other traffic-control device to reduce speeds on Greenwood Avenue North between North 53rd Street and North 54th Street.

"All we're asking for is a stop sign at the very least," one neighbor said at the meeting.

Representatives of seven homes attended the meeting to support the construction of sidewalks on the 8700 block of First Avenue Northwest, another of the prioritized projects.

Neighbors said that stretch has become unsafe with an increase in vehicle traffic.

"It doesn't feel safe ever when I'm walking with my daughter to the store," said one woman.

Less than three weeks after being blanked 10-0 by Roosevelt, the Ballard High School softball team again found themselves on the wrong end of a 10-0 rout April 6.

Ballard, now 0-2 in the conference and 0-3 overall, has had a hard time on both sides of the ball.

In three games, the team is averaging only one run and is only doing that by scoring three runs against Sammamish March 23.

In that same span, it is giving up an average of 11 runs per game.

Most recently against Roosevelt, the Beavers got two hits but gave up 11.

As far as positives for the game, Ballard's pitchers Sophie Overlock-Pauley and Haley DeGarmo threw six strikeouts.

Ballard matches up with Garfield at 4 p.m., April 8 at Lower Woodland.