That’s the team we found in the kitchen at Arbor Heights Community Church for the ARK Park Spaghetti Dinner fundraiser tonight (the park-plan ringleaders we first introduced you to last summer were in the group – Jan Seidel with the salad, at left, Loretta Kimball with the spaghetti, second from right). We showed you the ceremonial groundbreaking last month; the church is raising money to turn a nearby parcel into a playground-centered park. Play figured into tonight’s event, too, with activities for kids in separate rooms after dinner:

By the time we arrived at the spaghetti dinner, 2 hours into the 3-hour event, they estimated they’d already fed more than 200 people! From there, we headed northeast to Delridge, where the Chief Sealth High School cafeteria was also full of good times and good food – plus good music, at the 7th annual Honor Choir and Mariachi Tamale Dinner. In addition to enjoying the talent of CSHS student musicians, diners also heard from guest groups such as Mariachi Quinto Sol, featuring University of Washington students and alumni – here’s one of the songs they performed:

While at Chief Sealth, we bumped into a former TV co-worker, Lowell Deo, who was there to work on a Seattle Channel TV feature about CSHS that will air in his ongoing CityStream series later this spring – he promised to let us know when it’s scheduled, so we can let you know to watch for it. (Lowell profiled us halfway through this CityStream episode six months ago [15 minutes into the program].)