CREATIVE KIRKLAND

Tell us your Kirkland background.
I moved to Kirkland with my family in 1971, I think. I raised my children on Waverly (about a block away). That was almost 40 years ago. I helped start the Community School and Northstar Junior High. Those are two alternative schools that are still ongoing. Kirkland had a fairly good reputation for its school district. But there were things I thought could be enhanced, so that’s why I got involved with the alternative schools. As a matter of fact, my granddaughter is now going to Community School. I’ve been on the Chamber of Commerce board, the [Kirkland] Arts Center board (I was president for two years), and helped start the Downtown Association; I was on that board for quite a while. I owned a store on Lake Street all through the 80s called the Silver Willow. A lot of people know me from that. I closed the store in 1990, and started part time at Parkplace Bookstore in 1991... In 2002, Mary Harris (my business partner) and I bought the bookstore.

How did you end up here?
It was the house. A friend of mine worked for a bank and knew there was a house for sale. We had moved down from Bellingham (where I met my husband at Western Washington University) and we were looking for a house to buy. It came available at a really good price. I was familiar with Kirkland, but I knew it as a sleepy little town. A lot has changed. I grew up in Bothell. My parents’ best friends, Paul and Helen Kirk, started the Creative Arts League (now the Kirkland Arts Center).

What do you find unique about living & working in Kirkland?
In many ways it’s a wonderfully small town even though the population figures have doubled, tripled over the years. People here, especially in the core area, have a sense of it being their community. I love the amount of involvement that people have in Kirkland. And physically, the parks are wonderful – the city has done a great job over the years of purchasing property and keeping it for the public. That’s one of the reasons we have the number of parks we have. And the waterfront. And its wonderful we have a baseball field in the middle of our downtown core, even though it’s probably not the best use of property for business/retail – but I think it’s wonderful we have it.

What do you enjoy most about Kirkland?
The people. Anywhere you are, the people describe your surroundings.