Couve Scoop

DECEMBER 2021

Must See Holiday Houses

The holiday season is here, and a handful of local families have gone all out to celebrate and decorate for the most wonderful time of the year. Meet two of these families and find out what motivates them to spend so much time, money and effort to spread Christmas cheer. East Side Vancouver: Countryside Park

West Side Vancouver: Holidays on Franklin

Jim Mains and his wife, Cecilia, have lived on Franklin Street in Vancouver since 2010. But Mains’s interest in holiday home decorating goes way back to stringing up Christmas lights with his family of origin and childhood neighbors when he was as young as 8. “When I was younger, I would help an older friend in our neighborhood decorate her home. She would go all out. She really inspired me and gave me the decorating bug,” he says. Over the ensuing decades, Mains’s holiday decorating has gradually grown to what is now a huge display with its own name: Holidays on Franklin. The Mains family decorates for all the major holidays but Halloween and Christmas are the biggest events, drawing hundreds of families to view thousands of lights and props. The Christmas work begins the day after Halloween, with Mains’s 20-year-old twin goddaughters, Grace and Lucy, helping and his small children, ages 5 and 2, enjoying the entire process. Decking out for the holidays is so much a part of the Mains family’s life that a few years ago they purchased the lot next to their home just they could expand their holiday displays. And expand it has: neighbors have joined in on the fun, and this year the display features over 120,000 Christmas lights over eight properties, along with a Christmas Wish Food Drive. “We love seeing people’s reaction to the decorations,” Mains says. “So many families and especially children walk by watching us put the display up. It’s fun to walk outside and stand in the ground and hear people’s reactions to the lights. Our kids love it . . . They get so excited in August when they see all the boxes coming out in preparation [for the Halloween and Christmas seasons]. I hope we will continue to do this for many years to come. Our children love to participate with us and I hope they will want to carry on the tradition.” You can view Holidays on Franklin through January 6 at 4616 NW Franklin Street in Vancouver, next to Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School.

Brad Buchanan’s enthusiasm for Christmas decorating came directly from growing up in Yakima with his own father, who won multiple awards for their family’s holiday decorations. When Buchanan purchased his home on 7th Street, across from Countryside Park in Vancouver in 1991, he immediately started growing his holiday display, with the help of a good friend. Unfortunately, vandalism and theft eventually left him discouraged, and for a time he scaled down and even sold many of his decorations. But his son helped turn things around. “It wasn’t until my younger son Brant started helping that the display started growing again,” Buchanan says. “His passion for decorating started growing and he began buying his own decorations after Christmas when they went on sale. Each year he would buy a little more and even find decorations in the off-season. His growing interest in decorating also re-sparked my passion. It was and still is a great bonding experience putting up the display and building decorations together.” Today, Buchanan is the one helping his grown sons, who now spearhead the display that takes 3-4 weeks to put everything up, not to mention hours of testing and bulb replacement, which Buchanan says he and his sons start in early October. Together they estimate they have spent more than $10,000 on Christmas decorations. The cost has been well worth it. “We have so many regulars that come by year after year, some for over 20 years, and admire what we do . . . It truly warms our hearts to get the appreciation we have and know that we can provide happiness during Christmas time through our display.” Though they don’t decorate for Valentine’s Day, the Buchanan family has even unwittingly played Cupid. One year, a couple dropped off flowers with photos and a letter that read, “Because of You . . . We Found Love.” “It explained that our Christmas display started a connection between the two that led them to get married and combine into a family of 9,” Buchanan recalls. “It was a ‘Thank You’ for putting up the display, because it helped them find love. This story is unbelievable and we are so thankful they shared it with us.”

The Buchanan family’s Christmas display is live through January 2, and new this year will be a donation box to raise funds for Shriner’s Children’s Hospital in Portland.

Far left: Holidays on Franklin

Courtesy Jim Mains

Left: Countryside Christmas

Courtesy Brad Buchanan

Page 9: Elaine Pitassi, Katie Carson and Kimberly Koch of Camas business Truly Scrumptious, photographed by Lara Blair (pictured in inset) as part of The Pivot

CHIROPRACTOR: Mignon Cejalvo DC (Dr. Min)

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THE PIVOT PROJECT: Downtown Camas

Camas photographer, Lara Blair, recently highlighted the resilience of fellow Camas business owners in a special public exhibit called “The Pivot Project” that displayed at Nuestra Mesa restaurant in Downtown Camas in November. She says the inspiration for the project hit her from the back of a motorcycle. “My husband and I were riding through Downtown Camas on our way home from a trip and I got to thinking about how amazing it was that so many businesses were not only surviving, but thriving, during this pandemic,” she says. “I saw some of my fellow Main Street people at the coffee shop and I thought, ‘It would be so cool to do a project where we honor our resilience as a community. I wonder if [Camas business owners] would show up at my studio for a picture?’” Not one to waste time, Blair got started right away. “That evening I texted all my friends who have shops on Main Street to tell them my idea and the feedback was immediate and wonderful.” With the help of Downtown Camas Association (DCA) to get the word out to Camas business owners, Blair scheduled 37 photography sessions over a three-day period. At each photo shoot, Blair and her assistant also collected each business owner’s pandemic pivot stories to include with the black and white photos in the culminating exhibit. “The conversations between me, my assistant, Erin Endreson, and the DCA rep (and my stylist) Caroline Mercury and all the folks who came in were just fantastic. So much positivity and a feeling that ‘we made it!’ I’ve never felt more in community with downtown than I did that day. It was gratifying to see everyone doing well.” Blair hopes that the optimism, hope and sense of community that she felt during those whirlwind days of putting this project together will be contagious. “My hope is that we will all gain inspiration from reading what each person has been through,” she says. She emphasizes that there is something significant that comes out of going through a crisis together and coming out the other side stronger for it. “I think there’s already a lot of respect down here among the business owners and teams, but it’s truly special when you thrive together in these circumstances. We are one scrappy town with a lot of heart and passion for serving our customers and clients. I’m so proud to have my business in Downtown Camas and thankful I got to capture these stories. I could’ve called it 'We Are Still Standing,' but I thought The Pivot Project showed what had to be done to make it through. We made history--- it will always remind us of what we’re made of as a community.” Now that the physical exhibit has ended, The Pivot Project can be viewed on Instagram at @larablairphotography or on Facebook at @ LaraBlairPhotography.

Dr. Min is passionate about helping mothers make natural choices about their pregnancy and the health of their family. Dr. Min is a member of the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association and has been certified in the Webster Technique since 2006. Focusing on: Pre/Postpartum Care, Newborns, Infants, Children and Pregnancy Massage. we accept most major health plans! 3401 SE 192nd Ave #107 Vancouver, WA 98683 360-882-7733 www.prioritylifechiro.com

Vancouver Makes Livability.com’s

TOP 10 Best Places to Live in America

Most of us already know that Clark County is a fantastic place to live, but Vancouver was recently honored officially as one of the top 10 best places to live by Livability.com. Each year, the community research organization calculates and ranks the safety, affordability, economic stability, outdoor recreation, accessibility and community engagement of more than 1,000 small to mid-size cities based on surveys and data to produce their Top 100 Best Places to Live in America. The 2021 list is especially significant since, due to the pandemic-driven increase in individuals working from home, many Americans are moving to locations where they want to live, rather than where they have to live based on proximity to work, and Livabilty reports that since March 2020, more than 42% of the U.S. population has either moved or considered moving. Vancouver ranked no. 10 on the list and nearby Hillsboro, Oregon ranked no. 7. The no. 1 best place to live according to Livability is Madison, Wisconsin.