Ell Alley: 2016

Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Christmas 2016

Jordan & Steve bought the food for Christmas dinner on Friday afternoon. Saturday was Christmas Eve. We did our usual things until 4:00 PM when we went to visit Greg & Anisa. They live in our building of 5 units at the opposite end from us. They served snacks & drinks at their dining room table. We stayed for 2 hours. Then we went to Foo Lam for dinner. We opened presents on Christmas morning. There were more gifts than ever before. Rusty made blueberry scones for breakfast, then blueberry pancakes & eggs for brunch. Jordan's family came for dinner at 7:00 PM: Carol, Sherry & Shirley, Alex, Colleen, Gail, Iris & Andrew, Bleys & Kyndahl. We had ham, potatoes, quiche, polenta, Brussels sprouts & pecan pie. They were here 4 hours. The day was partly sunny & fairly warm at 42. It was a very nice day.

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Pumpkin Carving Party 2016

We had our 3rd annual pumpkin carving party on Friday night, October 28, from 7 to 9:30. There were 13 guests: 9 neighbors & 4 friends/co-workers of Rusty. Everyone brought a pumpkin. They started carving immediately & spent almost 2 hours at it. Some also brought food & wine. When all of the pumpkins were carved, they set them on the bench outside our front door & on the pavement beneath it. They lit candles in each one. Everyone took photos. On Halloween night, we had 63 trick-or-treaters, the most ever.

Monday, July 11, 2016

July Sunset

West

Northwest

North

East

Southeast

This sunset wasn't very colorful. But it was an amazing display of light throughout the sky.

Saturday, July 9, 2016

June Garden

Clarkia amoena (Farewell to Spring) in the ash tree garden.

Erigeron glaucus 'Sea Breeze' (Beach Aster) in the native meadow.

Mimulus cardinalis (Scarlet Monkey Flower) in the native meadow.

Phlomis (Jerusalem Sage) in the patio garden.

Stachys cooleyae (Cooley's Hedge Nettle) in the native meadow.

June 2016 was 2.6 degrees warmer & slightly wetter than normal at 1.77 inches. Steve said the native meadow really looked like a meadow now. The bed below the patio wall also looked great with abundant daylilies.

Tuesday, June 7, 2016

May Garden

Alchemilla mollis (Lady's Mantle) in the Ash Tree Garden

Allium cristophii (Star of Persia) in the Sidewalk Garden

Allium karataviense 'Ivory Queen' (Turkestan Onion) in the Sidewalk Garden

Clematis integrifolia in the Patio Garden

Alchemilla mollis & Fatshedera lizei 'Aureo Maculata' in the Patio Garden

Festuca ovina var. glauca 'Elijah Blue' (Blue Fescue) in the Sidewalk Garden

Heuchera chlorantha in the Native Garden

Penstemon serrulatus in the Native Garden

Phlomis fruticosa (Jerusalem Sage) in the Patio Garden

Stachys cooleyae (Cooley's Hedge Nettle) in the Native Garden

May 2016 was almost 4 degrees warmer than normal, with less than half the normal amount of rain. High temperatures were mostly between 50 & 70. There was a soaking rain only on 5/19 & 5/21. The new sidewalk garden was surprisingly spectacular for its first year in bloom. Penstemon serrulatus bloomed prolifically in the native garden. The patio garden cascaded farther down the wall toward the parking pad.

Saturday, May 28, 2016

May Sunset

This sunset came in early May, when it was often cloudy, but there was little rain.

About Ell Alley

Ell Alley is the home of Jetta, Jordan, Kitty, Rusty, Steve & Toby. It is named for the alley beside & behind the house that forms an ell: the shape of the letter L. It is located in the Rainier Vista development, in the Rainier Valley of Seattle, which extends 7 miles southeast from Downtown Seattle to Rainier Beach, between Beacon Hill & the lakeside ridges of Mt Baker, Lakewood & Seward Park. Ell Alley is 4 miles from Downtown Seattle, 0.4 miles from the Columbia City Station & 0.7 miles from the center of the Columbia City Landmark District.

Rainier Valley History

The first settlers arrived in the 1850s, but settlement was slow until the forest was cut down & milled, as it was throughout the city. Developers bought logged-off land toward the end of the 19th century. They laid out the communities of Genesee, Columbia City, Hillman City, Brighton & Dunlap.

Cheap land in the valley, just outside the City of Seattle, attracted Italians of rural origins & they planted large, productive gardens. The north end of the Rainier Valley became known as Garlic Gulch. Japanese immigrants also had farms in the valley. The produce filled local markets including Pike Place.

The Rainier Avenue Electric Railway opened the valley to greater development, reaching Columbia City in 1891 & Renton in 1896. In 1907, the City of Seattle annexed most of southeast Seattle, including the Rainier Valley.

At the start of World War II, Japanese residents were forced into internment camps east of the mountains. Tens of thousands of war workers came to Seattle to work at the Boeing Company, the shipyards & the port. The US government constructed thousands of temporary housing units at Rainier Vista, Stadium Homes (now Mt Baker Village) & Holly Park in the Rainier Valley.

After the war, the temporary housing became public, low-income housing. Suburban development took many white residents away from the valley. Blacks moved into the Rainier Valley from the over-crowded, nearby Central Area. Interracial couples found acceptance here. Filipinos arrived in large numbers.

After the fall of Saigon in 1975, refugees came from southeast Asia: Vietnamese, Cambodian, Hmong, Lao & Mien peoples. Many settled in the Rainier Valley. Chinese continued to arrive, although most settled on nearby Beacon Hill. There was a small influx of Mexicans. Somali immigration began after US involvement in Somalia in 1992.

Work on new housing at NewHolly (formerly Holly Park) began in 1997 & continued for a decade, with 1400 units sold to private owners. The rebuilding of Rainier Vista began in 2003 & still continues. Columbia City rapidly gentrified starting in the late 1990s. Many units of new housing were built in the form of townhouses, condos & apartments.

The current population of the Rainier Valley is about 41,000. The racial breakdown is 34.1% Asian, 26.9% Caucasian, 26% African American, 1.6% Pacific Islander, 6.5% Mixed Race, 1% Native American and 3.4% from other races. Hispanic or Latino of any race are 7.2% of the population.

Our Land & Climate

The city of Seattle rests between 2 bodies of water: Puget Sound & Lake Washington. Puget Sound is a substantial part of the Salish Sea & a very small part of the Pacific Ocean. The Salish Sea is set apart from the Pacific by the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington & Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia. The dense, wet clouds of the Pacific Ocean travel as far as the Cascade Mountains, near the Salish Sea & not very far from the ocean. East of the Cascades lies the desert of the Columbia Basin. The moist, temperate climate of Seattle extends south to northern California & north to southeastern Alaska. The Pacific Northwest Coast from San Francisco Bay to Cook Inlet shares a flora dominated by evergreen coniferous forest. The central portion, west of the Cascade Mountains, is called Cascadia. The climate is cool & wet from fall to spring, warm & dry in summer. The Olympic Mountains block Seattle from much of the Pacific rainfall. Seattle is drier than the Atlantic coast of North America & northern Europe, cooler in summer & warmer in winter. It lies near the latitude of Paris & Quebec City.

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