Articles by Carol Ladwig
Staff at Mount Si High School got into their own camouflage during Homecoming Week. In full face-paint and camp
Time to celebrate: Mount Si High School homecoming...
By Carol Ladwig • October 21, 2014 6:11 pm

Mount Si High School celebrated its homecoming last week, with spirit days, sports, and circus-themed dance with live performers.

For Thursday’s Camo Day, senior Julianna Foster borrowed some gear from her father to blend in. “I’m a tree!” she announced during her lunch break. Her friend, Amanda Triboulet bought some camp gear just for the day, but a lot of students didn’t have to work hard on their costume for the day. Maddy Trout, busily working on her phone in a circle of friends, sported a camp sweatshirt and backpack that she says are pretty standard for her.

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The Tokul Creek Trestle
Snoqualmie’s 100-foot Tokul Creek Trestle still draws travelers...
By Carol Ladwig • October 17, 2014 2:37 pm

Everyone stops on the Tokul Creek bridge. It’s not that they need to; the Snoqualmie Valley Trail rises very gently up the Valley, and the bridge is about a mile along it from Tokul Road. Whether they’re on two wheels or two feet, though, the people who explore the trail as far as the 100-year-old Milwaukee Railroad trestle bridge seem compelled to pause there, and take in the view.

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The Andersons
North Bend teen’s flying electric generator is taking...
By Carol Ladwig • October 14, 2014 3:47 pm

Alexander Anderson is no head-in-the-clouds academic.

On paper, he may seem like one, having graduated high school, earned a bachelor of science degree, started classes for his master’s degree, accumulated a stack of research for his doctorate, surpassed a theoretical limitation on electricity production, and started a company, Odin Energy Works, all by the age of 18. Alexander, though, knows how to talk to people, and when to go easy on his non-scientific audience.

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Valley school board decides: Bigger high school, bigger bond, lower rate
Valley school board decides: Bigger high school, bigger...
By Carol Ladwig • October 10, 2014 6:35 pm

Voters will decide on a $246 million school bond in the Snoqualmie Valley School District in February. The district’s board of directors voted 4 to 1 on Oct. 9 to proceed with a bond, slightly revised from the proposal under discussion for the past year.

A sixth elementary school, $20 million in repairs and updates to other district buildings, and a high school rebuild to bring freshmen back onto the main campus are all still components of the bond. Yet instead of either the staff-recommended 2,400-student high school, or the 2,100-student high school proposed by architects, the board has reached for something in between.

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Offering wine tastings (and sometimes
Old ideas, new wines: Piccola Cellars transforms former...
By Carol Ladwig • October 1, 2014 3:07 pm

Sleek blends with rustic in the Piccola Cellars new tasting room in North Bend. Warm gold walls, a polished concrete floor and steel light fixtures, give the place a modern edge, while the unfinished planks in the bar, plain picnic tables and, on warm days, the open garage doors, create a homey feel.

It’s a good look for a business that combines new technology, an old idea, and an ancient tradition.

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Personal carpenter: Q&A with North Bend's Jonathan Seaton, custom woodworker
Personal carpenter: Q&A with North Bend’s Jonathan Seaton,...
By Carol Ladwig • September 26, 2014 6:27 pm

Carpenter Jonathan Seaton walks that fine line between artist and craftsman, crossing into either territory with each piece he produces. At his North Bend workshop—he has no storefront, but then, he has no inventory, either—he builds wood furniture to the exacting specifications of both his customers, and himself.

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Fall City artist Don Fels
Sense of the season: Meadowbrook art honors Snoqualmie...
By Carol Ladwig • September 23, 2014 4:46 pm

It was intended as a short-term creation—and it will be, in the grand scheme—but the art work to be dedicated at 10 a.m., at Meadowbrook Farm Saturday, Sept. 27, is too timeless to be temporary.

Begun as a site-specific installation funded by King County’s 4Culture, the Mary Louie Project, with its interplay of local history and culture and natural beauty, held such appeal for the Meadowbrook Farm board, artist Don Fels said, that board members asked him to make it permanent.

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Finally, a new school secretary contract: Union, District 410 ink deal a year after old one expires
Finally, a new school secretary contract: Union, District...
By Carol Ladwig • September 23, 2014 8:05 pm

They started another school year without a valid employment contract, but the Snoqualmie Valley School District secretaries soon got one, with a unanimous vote.

All 38 members of the Snoqualmie Valley Administrative Secretaries Association, or SVASA, voted Wednesday, Sept. 10, to accept a four-year contract with the district, union president Karen Seiser reported at the Sept. 11 school board meeting.

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Carnation going to the polls for more police coverage
Carnation going to the polls for more police...
By Carol Ladwig • September 17, 2014 2:08 pm

This time, Carnation may have gotten it right. Although a small majority of city voters have historically rejected any proposed tax increases for police services—the ‘no’ votes outnumbered the ‘yes’ by as few as 23 in the last three ballot measures—they could be the minority in November.

Carnation’s Proposition 1 on the general election ballot is still a tax increase for police, but for increased coverage only. So, if voters approve the ballot measure in November, the city will have $70,000 to spend on things like extra night and weekend patrols and drug house surveillance, but not on the standard cost of the city’s service contract with the King County Sheriff’s Office.

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It was a family finish for the Epic Racing team
Do the Iron Horse! Photos from North Bend’s...
By Carol Ladwig • September 17, 2014 1:53 pm

Running and cycling were just the start of the activities offered at North Bend’s Adventure Sport Festival Saturday, Sept. 6. While teams and individual athletes paddled Lake Kecheelus, cycled down and through North Bend, ran the trail and came together for a final sprint to the finish, other athletes pursued their own sports.

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More students in Valley schools: Fall counts show pupil population rising in unexpected ways
More students in Valley schools: Fall counts show...
By Carol Ladwig • September 16, 2014 5:32 pm

Student enrollment is up, but not in the ways that Snoqualmie Valley School District staff were expecting this school year. Comparing start-of-year enrollment numbers with the 2013-14 official count taken in October, staff reported that the number of student full-time equivalents, or FTEs, has increased, and most significantly at the high school.

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February bond possible for new school package: SVSD board: ‘Tonight we’ve got to move forward’
February bond possible for new school package: SVSD...
By Carol Ladwig • September 11, 2014 11:20 am

They have a goal, to present a bond issue to voters in February. Now, the Snoqualmie Valley School Board needs to finalize the details of that bond, and they have about a month to do it.

When the board met Thursday, Aug. 21, Superintendent Joel Aune reminded the group that he and staff had been asked to develop a timeline for a February bond proposition, which they presented July 9. He went over some of the critical deadlines involved, saying “To move toward a February bond proposition… the latest that we feel would be reasonable for the board to make a formal decision around the bond proposition, would be around the first of October.”

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