Light moves: Custom exterior lighting marks holidays, shows team spirit
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 7 months, 1 week AGO
Joel Martin has been with the Columbia Basin Herald for more than 25 years in a variety of roles and is the most-tenured employee in the building. Martin is a married father of eight and enjoys spending time with his children and his wife, Christina. He is passionate about the paper’s mission of informing the people of the Columbia Basin because he knows it is important to record the history of the communities the publication serves. | March 13, 2026 12:50 AM
MOSES LAKE — Lighting up the outside of a house for the holidays looks pretty, but it can be a whole lot of work to set up. That’s what Moses Lake brothers Zach and Nate Thomas aim to change.
“Instead of traditional Christmas lighting where there's strings of lights, ours is an LED lighting product (in which) the bulbs go into a color matched aluminum track that matches your trim,” Zach said. “It’s decorative, but it’s also functional.”
The lights from Lights by HomeOne are installed as a permanent fixture under the soffit, the underside of the house’s eave, Zach said, and controlled by a phone app.
“You just set your preferences the (first) time with installation,” he said. “You set up your timer so that at sunset, it's going to come on to some classy down lighting. You can set a security setting; I have mine at 10:30 p.m. so one in every 10 bulbs is on, so it just gives a little bit of light. And then at sunrise it goes off.”
The lights aren’t just white illumination; however, they also have a mixture of colors that can be programmed through the app. The app also features presets for users who prefer to do things the easy way.
“Say you want to do all U.S. holidays,” Zach said. “You just click one button and then automatically on Fourth of July it'll do red, white and blue. For Halloween it will change colors 10 days before Halloween. The month of December it’s Christmas lights. You don't even have to touch anything. Not only do you not have to put up extra lights, you don't even have to push extra buttons.”
There are presets for favorite sports teams, to change over when the game is on, said Kip Burns, who had his MarDon-area home outfitted with Lights by HomeOne a couple of years ago, he said.
“When people come to our house, if it's daylight, they don't even know (the lights) are there,” Burns said. “We love the Seahawks, we love the Mariners, our local teams. Well, in the app, you can (program it) so when the Seahawks play, as soon as they're going to kick off, the lights go to the Seahawk colors. And when the Seahawks score, the lights flash in celebration. It's amazing. We've come home in the evening one time and went, ‘Oh, the Mariners are playing tonight’ because our lights are outside will come on. (With the Mariners) there'll be a hit and somebody will get a home run, and the lights will flash the colors. It's unbelievable.”
The Thomas brothers sell Lights by HomeOne as a sideline, they said. During the day, they’re both physicians, specializing in family medicine. Zach practices at Samaritan Healthcare, and Nate at Confluence Health.
The brothers discovered Lights by HomeOne in their hometown of Calgary, Alberta, they said. When they finished medical school and set up their homes in Moses Lake, they looked around for something else to do, and this was something they could do in their extra time.
“We don't really see ourselves as salespeople, where we're trying to talk you into why you need the lights,” Nate said. “Most people we talk to already realize that they need something. And then when they see our lights, they see it as a viable solution, whether it be ‘I never have to get up on the ladder to put up my Christmas lights again’ or ‘My yard is so dark (and) I've had people sneaking around the back and breaking into our shed.’”
“They're not cheap, but they've been well worth it,” Burns said.
ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
Endless battle
Noxious Weed Control Board works to keep invasive plants under control
MOSES LAKE — Some of the nastiest plants in Grant County were the topic of a class led by Jay Johnson, a consultant with the Grant County Noxious Weed Control Board, Tuesday. The Noxious Weed Control Board, as its name would suggest, is tasked with keeping weeds under control in Grant County. That’s not a small job; the board’s website lists 129 species of noxious weeds that are found around Grant County. A noxious weed is defined as an invasive, non-native plant that threatens agricultural crops, local ecosystems or fish and wildlife habitat, according to the Noxious Weed Control Board. Washington state law requires that these weeds be identified and their spread kept to a minimum, if not completely eradicated. “We’re one of those agencies a lot of people don’t really understand,” Johnson said. “We’re a county office and … our funding is tax-based assessment. When you get your tax bill and you look down at all the expenses that you pay for, there we are.”
BASIN EVENTS: Oct. 16-24
COLUMBIA BASIN — Whether you feel like shopping, crafting, learning or seeing a show, there’s something happening for you this week in the Basin. Oct. 16 ‘My Family (Mi Familia)’ screening Spanning three generations, “My Family (Mi Familia)” is a heartfelt drama that follows the Sánchez family as they build their lives in East Los Angeles. Through love, hardship, triumph, and sacrifice, the film explores the immigrant experience, the strength of family bonds, and the traditions that connect one generation to the next. Lowrider show and taco truck before the screening. Sponsored by Columbia Basin Allied Arts, EDUBS C/S and the Moses Lake Creative District. $12 per person. Doors open at 6 p.m., film begins at 7 p.m. at the Moses Lake Civic Center Auditorium, 401 S. Balsam St. Tickets and info: www.cba-arts.org.
Moses Lake author encourages women to look beyond church culture norms
MOSES LAKE — A Moses Lake author’s book, “A Christian Woman Striving to Live Her Faith in a Man-Controlled World,” takes aim at the role to which many churches relegate the female half of their congregations. “It’s to encourage women in the faith,” Linda Curran said. “A lot of churches say, ‘Teach Sunday school, do this, do that, but don’t (evangelize.)’" In her book, Curran recounts a time when she moved to a new community and joined a church there. She was surprised to learn that, as a new female member, she had been automatically assigned church cleaning duties. When she questioned it, she wrote, she was met with condescension and her objections were brushed aside. In other churches, she said, women who were capable of teaching were relegated to “women’s ministry.”

