Earlier today, we published the West Seattle Junction Association‘s announcement of this year’s Summer Fest music lineup. The shows are all free to watch – but somebody has to pay the bands – and WSJA is that “somebody,” with help from you. Here’s a fun way to help: The next Rock Walk, a showcase for local beverages and local businesses, set for 5-9 pm Friday, June 19:

-Includes beer, wine, cider and spirits
-Friday, June 19th from 5-9 PM
-$40 ticket includes:
*12 tastes
*Tasting glass
*Tote for purchases
*Map of sip stops
*Approx 30 stops and 30 local beverage partners

Full lineup of participants can be found here.

You can buy your ticket(s) for the Rock Walk by going here.

Whether or not you’re going to WestSide Baby‘s “Night Out“ benefit in two weeks, you can support the local nonprofit by bidding in its online auction, which has just begun! Here’s the announcement:

WestSide Baby’s online auction is live NOW through Sunday, June 7 at 5:00 PM, featuring incredible experiences, local getaways, sports tickets, and so much more – all generously donated by our amazing community of supporters!

Additional auction items will also be available at A Night Out with WestSide Baby: Celebrating 25 Years, the organization’s upcoming fundraiser and birthday celebration taking place Friday, June 5 from 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm at the WestSide Baby warehouse in White Center.

This special evening will celebrate 25 years of WestSide Baby’s work supporting local children and families. They invite you to join in on the fun and celebrate with food, cocktails, games, stories from throughout WestSide Baby’s history, and an inspiring program about the impact the WestSide Baby community has made together over the past quarter century.

Most importantly, all proceeds from the auction and event support WestSide Baby’s mission of providing diapers, clothing, car seats, safe sleep items, and other essentials to local children and families.

Learn more, purchase tickets, or participate in the auction at WestSide Baby.

If you can donate blood, you can sign up for a West Seattle slot as soon as tomorrow and get a chance at a travel giveaway too – here’s the announcement we were asked to share with you:

Imagine the warm Hawaiian sand between your toes as a thank you for saving lives here in the PNW! In gratitude for your blood donation in April and May, you and a guest could win roundtrip airfare and a 3-night stay in a lush ocean-view room at Oahu’s beautiful Waikiki Beach Marriott Resort. Do something good, go somewhere incredible! More information here!

Help is needed at upcoming West Seattle blood drives! Please sign up and attend if you can!

-Thurs May 14 at Alki Masonic Lodge, bus drive (4736 40th Ave SW)
-Fri May 15 at West Seattle YMCA (3622 SW Snoqualmie St)
-Sun May 17 at West Seattle Junction – bus parked in Key Bank parking lot
-Mon May 25 at Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (4001 44th Ave SW)

If you can’t make a drive in May, please try and attend a West Seattle drive in JUNE!

Here is the link to sign up for any of the West Seattle drives!

If you need helping booking an appointment, please call Bloodworks DONOR CARE TEAM at 800-398-7888 or e-mail schedule@bloodworksnw.org

Friendly reminders to hydrate well and eat a meal prior to giving blood and bring photo ID. Please consider eating foods rich in iron leading up to blood donation day.

(WSB file photo: All ages welcome at West Seattle 5K!)

Reminder that one week from today – Sunday, May 17 – is your first and biggest chance to run/walk Alki in a 5K this spring/summer – this year’s West Seattle 5K, presented by the West Seattle High School PTSA. The West Seattle 5K is a fundraiser for programs supporting WSHS students. You can still register online to be part of this community event: westseattle5k.com. (Also remember, Alki and Harbor Avenues will close for a few hours next Sunday morning for the WS5K, which starts at 9:30 am.)

Our letter carrier brought the familiar blue bag today – the one we can fill with nonperishable food to leave for pickup on Saturday (May 9) during Stamp Out Hunger. Along with West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day, the second Saturday in May always brings this unique food drive by the National Association of Letter Carriers, so we always remind you to leave out your bag – if you can donate – before shopping and/or selling on Saturday! Put your donation bag by wherever you get your mail – box, door slot, etc. – and it’ll be collected and sorted for distribution to partners that serve food banks. If you don’t get the “official” bag, no worries, you can use any other bag you have (just be sure it’s sturdy since carriers have to tote the bags back to their vehicles). This has been a tradition since 1993!

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

The Center for Active Living “wants to be your community gathering place,” even if you’re not a senior – yet.

So declared The Center’s executive director Amy Lee Derenthal as she spoke to supporters at Tuesday’s “The Center of It All” benefit breakfast, an event so big that it has a new home, Brockey Center at South Seattle College. Besides The Center’s own West Seattle Junction building being a “community gathering place,” she said while making the case for giving, it is also a home to services that you might not need when you first start visiting in your 50s or 60s, “but that eventually become absolutely essential.” Here’s everything Derenthal told the crowd:

A theme woven through the speakers was that The Center is more than it seems, in so many ways. Each week, myriad health and fitness classes are offered (you can see them on The Center’s calendar). Line-dance teacher Chris Banta noted that her specialty isn’t just performed to country music – she and her students have line-danced recently to decidedly not-country artists like Elvis Costello and The Spice Girls.

She didn’t lead a demonstration, but Tai Chi teacher Richard Lazeres did, saying he’d do his best to condense 30 years of teaching into five minutes:

(We also note, checking The Center’s calendar for this report, Lazeres is leading a birding class there as we write!) In a nod to the calendar date – May 5th – Cinco de Mayo music was provided by the mariachi musicians of Estrellas de México, before breakfast was served.

During breakfast, the most moving story came from Katy Aversenti Schumaker, a Center board member who talked about her mom’s time at The Center, while fighting eventually deadly cancer

For anyone in the crowd who wasn’t already a Center volunteer and/or member, a new “Day at The Center” video was shown to give them a taste of what happens there, day in and day out (and some nights too!)

As a fundraiser, this event was fairly simple – rather than auctions, there was a raffle, with tickets sold in the early going, and a monetary donation opportunity toward the end. Attendees had been reminded that memberships only cover 10 percent of The Center’s budget. Some of it comes from grants and government allocations – one elected official that got a shout-out for being there was District 1 City Councilmember Rob Saka:

Now that the final totals are in today, Derenthal had this message for supporters:

Thank you to everyone who joined us for our Annual Fundraising Breakfast, “The Center Of It All.” It was such a joy to see so many new and familiar faces celebrating together. I’m proud to share that we had 300 people in attendance, a new record for this event!

To our donors who couldn’t be there in person but still contributed to our campaign, thank you! Your support of our work means the world to me.

And a big thank you to Nucor, who surprised us again with a $12,000 matching gift, on top of their already generous sponsorship.

I’m excited to share that, thanks to you, we exceeded our $125,000 fundraising goal and raised more than $150,000! These funds will have a lasting impact on our organization, putting us in a great position to serve more community members in 2026.

Kudos to our peer-to-peer fundraisers, table captains, board members and volunteers for their help to make our event a success.

The message at the heart of it all is, as said at the event, “to meet the broad needs that come up as we all age as human beings.” You can support that any time by going here.

Members of the Denny International Middle School and Sanislo Elementary School communities have emailed us to ask us to tell you about Ka’Leah Rhodes, a current Denny and former Sanislo student in the fight of her young life, just 12 years old. A brain aneurysm put Ka’Leah in the hospital last week. She has four siblings, and this unexpected crisis is not only emotionally challenging her family but also posing a financial strain too. Ka’Leah is showing a sign of at least incremental improvement – family friend Jen tells us, “Excitingly, just today, she has started to be a bit more responsive with head nods yes and no! This is a first since this happened last Wed. We know she has a long road ahead. This is just the most incredible family and I know our West Seattle community is going to step up in this incredible time of need.” Family friends like Jen are already doing what they can, but the family can also use help with medical and other expenses, so a crowdfunding page has been set up for Ka’Leah and her family – see it here.

Story by Tracy Record
Photos by Torin Record-Sand
For West Seattle Blog

West Seattle Food Bank executive director Fran Yeatts took the stage during the nonprofit’s “Nourish and Flourish” gala Saturday night and recalled her uncertainty a year earlier about what was ahead.

And while the past year was most of what she feared it would be – rising costs, loosening safety nets – she also voiced appreciation for “the one shining light of this past year … the support we get from this community.”

There they were, surrounding her in the 4105 event venue‘s in-the-round space, the people who stepped up so many times, during the SNAP benefits crisis, for one, and in the need that has brought more people in for the non-food assistance that WSFB provides – emergency rent and utilities assistance, clothes from its Clothesline. Here’s everything Yeatts told the crowd:

Yeatts also recounted The Clothesline’s move to a new home months ago; the day it reopened in its new Delridge location, she recalled, was its busiest day ever, with 72 shoppers.

Other notable numbers from the past year were featured in this video, departing from the usual nonprofit-gala tradition of showing a video featuring clients’ testimonials. This one featured behind-the-scenes images of WSFB staff, and emcee/auctioneer Ian Lindsay invited attendees to cheer for them:

Another round of big cheers was bestowed on this year’s recipients of the food bank’s Nourishing Neighbors Award, First Lutheran Church of West Seattle (WSB sponsor), which Yeatts presented to church representatives including pastor Rev. Bryon Hansen:

First Lutheran Church always has been a strong supporter of the Food Bank, and of the West Seattle Helpline before its merger with WSFB.

In particular, Rev. Hansen’s predecessor, the late Rev. Ron Marshalll, was a deeply devoted supporter, and even wrote a book about the WSFB. The FLCWS contingent accepting the award said it should be an honor for him too.

No doubt he would have agreed with WSFB board president Joe Everett, who called it “more than a food bank,” powered by a “small army of volunteers” as well as the staff and community.

One other person who spent more than a few minutes at the mic was comedian Scott Losse – who brought some laughs to a night that at its heart was about very serious work and what it takes to support it.

Emcee Lindsay, of course, kept things lively.

He called the live auction, which as usual for WSFB events was centered on experiences – like the taco and margarita party with Yeatts and WSFB staffers, with three parties sold for $1,200 each, and getaways to both Northwest and tropical locales. Another gala component boosting the benefit was the Dessert Dash, which Lindsay said brought in about $25,000 from tables vying to get their choice of the desserts that awaited.

And there was a chance to simply commit to a cash donation; one generous donor started with a $10,000 commitment, and from there, a variety of four-, three-, and two-digit sums were promised too.

Today – first weekday after the gala – it was time for some number-crunching. We checked in with development director Robbin Peterson this afternoon, and got this update:

Thanks to our community, Nourish & Flourish raised $202,300 toward our $250,000 spring goal. We’re so close – but not quite there yet. As GiveBIG starts tomorrow, we’re inviting our community to help close that final gap. Give through GiveBIG or our website and help make sure neighbors have what they need to stay nourished and stable.