The Eastside Neighborhood Association is worked with City Parks Department to replace two trees in Lions Park. These trees they replaced were dead or diseased and removed by park staff. Through ENA efforts a planting party was held, Saturday 26th February 2022. This effort helps us maintain the beauty of Lions Park and our neighborhood.
From one of the volunteers, “There was a very successful project to plant two trees at Lion’s Park this morning. I think the attached picture shows most if not all the volunteers. Also, some good discussion on how to build on this effort, e.g., planting oak trees on Legion Way all the way to Edison.”
Lion’s Park Tree Planting Volunteers
No matter your abilities, knowledge or age, there are opportunities often to get involved within our neighborhood and help build community. If you know of a project, effort or need, feel free to reach out the ENA to get support.
Join New Bridge Community Church for one of three Candlelight Services (December 23rd, 6pm; December 24th, 4pm and 6pm). They will be singing some of the carols so many of us love that bring hope to our lives and we’ll end the evening with a traditional candle lighting. They love being a part of the Eastside neighborhood and hope that you’ll come celebrate with them. *We are following CDC guidelines for indoor gatherings.
THE ENA Board’s Subarea Planning Core Team would like to invite all interested neighbors to a Community Discussion at the Swantown Inn & Spa during Community Clubhouse operation on December 19th between 11am and 12 noon.
The lack of a continuous sidewalk on 7th Avenue SE, linking the lower neighborhood with Lion’s Park has been an issue brought up constantly over the past 20 years. The Core Team has made real progress with the city in fixing this and would like to share developments.
Attendees will be treated to full coffee service and snacks, courtesy of the Swantown Inn & Spa.
The Eastside Neighborhood Association has partnered with the Swantown Inn & Spa, to create a community clubhouse for the neighborhood. Swantown Inn & Spa is located on the corner of 11th Avenue South East and Central Street.
This clubhouse is a place within the boundaries of the neighborhood for neighbors to walk to and meet friends and fellow neighbors. The Swantown Inn will offer their espresso service and baked goods to the outside visitors. If you need a space for a meeting, you can also reserve space in the ballroom and they can be prepared for your groups size.
Currently Swantown Inn serves espresso drinks, tea, coffee and a variety of baked goods. The Inn worked with Olympia Coffee Roasters for their espresso setup along with sourcing their beans. All of the baked goods are made in house, from scratch.
The clubhouse is in the ballroom on the left side of the Inn. You can purchase drinks and baked items outside at the window or inside the ballroom. giving you the perfect choice from a pandemic perspective. If you go inside a mask is a must, and pandemic protocols are followed.
Opening hours are currently Friday, Saturday and Sunday, from 8am to Noon. Hours may be expanded if there is the demand. We would love to see you at the Inn! Our goal is to make our neighborhood more united and stronger, by fostering community.
The long term plan is to continue working with the city and have the area designated as a Neighborhood Center.
The Eastside Neighborhood Association invites you to walk around the neighborhood to view holiday-decorated windows, light displays, and decorated yards/porches. The event is the Eastside Neighborhood Winter Walkabout and the theme is “Hope.”
You can find the Google Map here. If you have suggests or want to nominate a display not on the map, contact us (details at end of this post).
Everyone can participate!
There are three different categories in which prizes will be awarded;
Painted Windows (which have been done in our neighborhood sporadically over the past 20 years)
Holiday Lights (someone needs to pick up the void left by OlyLights skipping a year!)
Decorated Yards and Porches (with or without lights, but more than just lights)
If you are not going to enter one of these categories, you can still vote for your favorites!
Painted Windows
Please consider decorating one or more of your windows prior to the December 16th. You can use tempera paint (washes off easily), paper, or any other means to reflect the “Hope.” theme. Think about reflecting the positive aspects of our neighborhood and this year’s holidays. Decorating your window may be a fun thing to do prior to the December holidays. And it will help improve the quality and togetherness of our neighborhood.
You may also like to use paper to decorate your window.
And here’s a link to photos of holiday decorated windows on Pinterest: Holiday Window Painting
If you are a window decorating expert, you can share advice on Nextdoor our ENA Facebook page or volunteer to help decorate somebody’s window.
Holiday Lights
We can pretty much all agree we love a good holiday light display. There are a quite a few regulars in our neighborhood that have large displays, inflatables and in between. They literally bring some dazzle in to our bleak winter evenings!
Decorated Yards and Porches
This is a category that is not only lights, but something a little extra. Whether it be a nice display of a publicly viewable Christmas tree, but remember there are many reasons for the season! There are multiple religious holidays this time of year, bring them all out and show the diversity of our great neighborhood.
Prizes
We are pleased to announce that we will be awarding prizes to participants. We will also award a prize to a random voter! Your neighbors will be the jury and vote for the winners in each category.
If you wish to officially submit for prize consideration and to be put on the map we will need the following from you;
Your name (Family name will do)
Email address
Location/Address of display (any special instructions, e.g. Window top left corner of house)
Category you are submitting for
Optional: name of display
The information will be used on the map. This year this will also double as a voting slip. Details for submitting will be on the form. Voting will start from December 16th continue through the end of December.
If you choose to decorate your location, please provide your address through Nextdoor or send it to Nathan Allan ([email protected]) or Roger Horn ([email protected]) by December 15th. We will use addresses (not names) to create a map of decorated locations. You may also contact Roger or Nathan if you have questions or suggestions about the event.
Hope you will participate in this event and have a fun time walking around our neighborhood this winter!
