kasey & friends shoot

kasey sue & her best buds in Ft. Pierce, FL

[note, the images are much crisper full size, i have to cram them in smaller for your page to load more efficiently]

portraits

So this past weekend i got to do some portraits for Clinton & Felicia to-be Cullins. Here are a couple of my favorites. If you want to see the other couple hundred, you'll have to bug them for the URL. ;-)

[note, the images are much crisper full size, i have to cram them in smaller for your page to load more efficiently]


















Check out my photography blog for a lot more.

Tony's Visit

So, in the midst of craziness, something pleasant was that my cousin Tony came to visit the last day & a half. He's visiting from England. It was really great to spend time with him and have grown-up conversations with one of my cousins. I have quite a few over in England and I don't know many of them at all, and if I have seen them, it was when I was a baby or very young. I've had a few times of being with Tony and Bobby, his older brother, so I feel like I'm closest to them. Something I probably knew but didn't put my finger on before is that Tony is someone that puts himself in other people's shoes a lot... I think he'd make a pretty good counselor, he says a lot of the stuff that I had to go to school to learn. It was cool to talk about how we both think it's important to connect with family and try to build relationships where they have kind of faded or just haven't even started yet. I feel a little refreshed in my desire to work on that some more, knowing that he plays a similar role in England, not that people wouldn't get together, but that sometimes we all need a little nudge. :-)

So in the last couple days, I think I wore him out, dragging him all over town and trying to make sure he got to do some things that he needed to do (Christmas shopping) and got to see some things that would interest him or that he might not have gotten to do or see... Monday night mum dropped him off and we all ate Wendy's together. After she went home, we went to a free concert on campus at UF showing Less Than Jake, a rock/ska band. That was enjoyable and quite an experience, quite a few funny people in the crowd being ridiculous etc.

Tuesday we rode bikes to my garden plot in the community garden, then met David for lunch at Back Yard Burger. After that we hit the mall for Christmas shopping. We found out there was going to be a basketball game Wednesday night, so we thought about going to that... Later that night we played hold 'em poker. David lost first both games, which was probably good anyway since he needed to go to bed. Tony won the first game and we quit the second game as it seemed it was never going to end and Tony kept announcing what cards he had in his hand out loud instead of inside his head. Quite a few humorous moments there.

Wednesday was campus tour day and I dragged him all over campus to see the Football stadium, some of the main student areas, the O'Connell Center, & we picked up some basketball tickets as well. This was the day I remembered to actually take some photos. :-)


american football field


o'connell center ready for the game later that day

We got home and had some lunch, a quick conversation about God, and I headed to class for the afternoon. David got home soon after that and Mum met them at the house. We all went to the basketball game at 7. We took a few pictures of us watching the game, but not so much of the game... but, hey these will be more valuable to us later.


us "kids" watching the game


the height of maturity runs in our family



having fun being silly


UF shakers turned wigs, very attractive, perhaps there will be modeling in their futures

Mum counted down the seconds until she could go to the karaoke night, which I admit I wasn't too excited about. But hoping to save Tony from a night with 50+ somethings and karaoke by himself with mum, I decided to tag along and made mum later than she wanted because I needed to upstage her outfit and put on sparkley eye shadow for the club. :-P

So we went and it turned out we still had plenty of time to get in a few embarrassing songs (yay) so what a relief. Mum went first with the Carpenters hit "Rainy Days & Mondays" sounding exactly like the recording. Tony was up next, but as he said he hadn't had enough beers for that made me go first with "Can't take my eyes off of You" (the redone version by Lauryn Hill). The key was off but after a few adjustments, I found it and being a "karaoke virgin" everyone paid attention and clapped, mostly out of surprise I think that I didn't stink. haha...

So, Tony was up last singing "Take on me" by aha. I guess I wasn't expecting much since he said he was terrible and not that good and on and on, so it really surprised me when he was actually great! I think we all loosened up after that, well I guess Tony and I did, since Mum had no fear whatsoever from the start, and we all sang another song each and did a little bit of dueting.


"i got you babe"

So I've learned that clubs/bars that cater to 50+ somethings can be fun after all, though no less smoky. We're planning on another karaoke night Tuesday when Jake brings Tony down from visiting him in Columbus GA and that of course is going to be even more hilarious and fun... generating even more loverly photos!

davidcolemanphotography

look who is so smarty and good at taking pictures now! david took these last night when i decided i wanted to join the piles of puppies on the dog bed.



click the pic to see more.

Health Prayers & Florida Basketball

So, Mark said we need to update.... ok ok ok.

Well in the prayer request department we've got some family health issues. I just found out today that our cousin Tara on David's mom's side is suffering from a pretty tough disease that has reached her bone marrow. It's very difficult to live with and is hard on the family. She is single & has a daughter, Paige who is 9 or 10 (I think). Please pray for both of them, that the family would know how to talk to Paige about this situation and that Tara would be kept well-taken care of. The next step is to look for a match to the bone marrow for a transplant.

My Dad, Gerry, is also facing some grave health issues right now. He's recently had some internal bleeding which miraculously stopped, but now is dealing with liver and gall bladder problems on top of managing Crohn's disease, which as of late has been pretty calm. Please pray that the tests turn out well and that his liver will stop jaundicing and be normal again. If not possible, please pray for a donor liver should he need it replaced.

If you're even in the mood for other news, David & I just went to an exhibition game for UF vs. Lynn University basketball last night. I got a few photos that are pretty fun, check them out.



UF 101 : Lynn 65



We had fun sitting with a couple of David's work pals, Patience & Amy and enjoyed being ridiculous with streamers once someone offered us some. If we can get spouse tickets, I'm sure we'll plan to go to a few more games in the coming season.

alan's art show

I went to Alan's Art Show yesterday at the Christian Study Center in Gainesville. It consisted of Alan's art, Alan's friends' art (including mine), live music (including me), cool people (that would be me included), neat photographers walking around (er, me), and the theme was black & green (look at me).



So anyway, here are the shots I took some time in editing from the show. Enjoy!

photo services

so, lately I have had a few people ask me to take photos of them for engagement pics, or for family pics, or other random things. I'm pretty excited to get some experience under my belt and perhaps make a few dollars. So, if you know anyone who is looking for a less expensive but awesome ;-) photographer, refer them to me and I could probably cut them a deal.

-jemma

Florida-Georgia

Ok, Georgia flat outplayed Florida today. Kudos to Willie Martinez for saving his job after the UT game (and the entire last season). Kudos to Moreno and UGA's DL. Well done.

I will revert to the tried and true Florida fan act of saying "Wait till next year". Except, since we've won 2 National Championships and 15 of the last 18 from UGA since anybody ran over us like Moreno did tonight, it's not cliche like it's been in decades past.

Next year:

• 76% of our team won't be freshmen or sophomores.
• Zook's terrible swan song 2004 recruiting class and Meyer's 2005 makeshift 1 month of recruiting class will be mostly gone.
  
• Major Wright won't be hurt.
• Tim Tebow won't be hurt.
  
• 4 starters on our DL won't go out with injuries.
• Kyle Jackson will graduate.
• Phil Trautwein (All-SEC OL) will be back from a foot injury after redshirting his 4th year.
• All those 76% of underclassmen who are the back to back #1 ranked recruiting classes in the nation will remember this loss.

Also, could somebody explain to me why Richt sent his team out to celebrate and taunt after that first TD? I mean, I know that's how he ran the show at FSU, but is that how we play in the SEC? I sure hope not. Even Spurrier, who knew how to run up the score, didn't intentionally send players off the bench to taunt, threatening them if they didn't. That just seemed very out of character for Richt, who has come a long way in the class department from his days at Miami and FSU. That is all.

This is a note to the SEC: Catch us this year. While we're down and young. Because the future is very bright in Gainesville.

-david

feeling mo' bettah

david and i are pretty much better now, which is nice. that was probably one of the longest colds i've had. it was over a week! yeesh! so i think i am getting addicted to facebook. i keep finding new friends! i can't help it! ok i can... and i will, right after i tell you about my latest photos.

i took some self-portraits because i wanted a recent photo of myself that was taken on purpose. i had some fun in lightroom with them and here are the results. click for more.

sicky poo! & mandolins!

me and david are sick sick sick! david missed work yesterday, he was not feeling good at all. after a day of rest, he is back in there, hopefully he is on the way out of it. i'm not sure what is happening with me, i feel better then i feel worse. heather dicus (mah good friend) brought us over some hot chicken noodle soup which she whipped up as soon as she heard we were sick. she is da' bomb. it was some fancy soup. heather what were those little leaf looking spice herb thingies?

please pray that we'll both be mo' bettah so that we can hang out with people this weekend at our homegroup retreat and i can sing at church sunday without getting everyone else sick too!

in other news, i'm learning to play the mandolin. it's kind of fun. my friend let me borrow hers. i need to find a way to plug it in so that i can hear how it is supposed to sound. apparently it is a lower end electric acoustic, meaning the acoustic isn't its strong point. maybe i can get my amp from home... mum? or did you steal it dad? :-P


love you all and thinking of you much!

-jem

colorado pics are up

if you didn't get to see pictures from my trip to colorado last august ('06) you should definitely check these out!

it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood

mr. rogers was right. we took a walk the other day and found all kinds of wonderful things to photograph. there are a lot of kitties, like this one



as well as homes that are quirky, like this one:



and even some pretty trash by the road:



it was a fun time. it is so nice outside now. how's your weather? click "say something" and let us know.

love, jemma

Cook off

So my team made ugly cake for the bake off. Except it wasn't called ugly cake, because Paula Deen tried to claim it as her own "gooey butter cake" recipe or something. Weak. So when I was putting it all together, I made it as smooth as possible, in an attempt to win appearance points. Also, we sprinkled powdered sugar on the top for this goal. This was futile, as seen by the pictures of the other desderts. And it made it taste not as good, in my opinion.


Moral of the Story: Never compromise ugly cake's looks in order to impress. The appeal is the ugliness followed by the amazing taste.

-david

bake-off pics

so our homegroup and another had a fun little event in which we formed teams and cooked different paula deen desserts and then had others judge them for taste, appearance, and adherence to the recipe. the winner was this autumn apple cake:


click to see more!

updates

so, i haven't heard anything back from the guy about the job and i called him to see what was happening with it - left a voicemail. so that's probably a no-go.

what else is new? well, i took the buddies to the vet, they hadn't been for over a year and it was time plus vera had something yucky happening with her eye - turns out it was conjunctivitis or as more commonly known, pink eye. coach had a bacterial infection in his ear which needed cleaning and treating and now they are both doing much better. Vera has some eyelashes to grow back, but otherwise they are doing fine. i just planted a bunch of florida broadleaf mustard greens for killian, because the vet says he is too hot and i should feed him greens. hopefully that will be helpful and he will actually eat it. no big deal though since it is 75cents for like 5 million seeds at the seed and feed store.

i haven't taken many photos lately. i don't want to say i've been busy because i have free time. sometimes i'm just not sure where it all goes. i know something that i would like to change is getting up earlier. it is definitely a big struggle area in my life and i really want God to give me victory over it so that i can be more productive and share david's feelings of weariness at the same time as him, so i can be more understanding and supportive. it seems so simple, and i've heard all the advice in the world, but i know it just comes down to allowing God to be glorified in that area of my life, my day.

so, i hope to take some more photos sometime soon. i'm sure there are people who want their photo taken. anyone? i'm thinking i should snap some shots of that weins baby, so cute!

dear auburn,

i don't like you. puh.

jemma

on being southern

david has cultural day tomorrow at work, which is another one of Nationwide employee's excuses to have a pot-luck lunch every five minutes. at least it is on diversity though, which is worthwhile to teach people that just because they are white, it doesn't mean they have no culture.
to make it apply to white people on a level they can understand nationwide gave an example along the lines of lifestyle. however their example was pretty lame, "like if you're a single parent, you could bring in frozen dinners" as if all single parents don't cook or something. it's about diversity, not how everyone in a certain situation is the same. anyway, i'll get on with it.

so thinking about his lifestyle david thought it would be a good idea to cut up clif bars into small pieces to bring in, since he uses them for breakfast food. they are full of protein and fiber and actually taste good and can hold him over til lunch, therefore beating out cereal (david says he's allergic to milk) and waffles (he burned through 2 of them in like 6 months). but i thought that would be a waste of good clif bars since people probably wouldn't eat them and decided to go back to good old regular culture.

i called up david's mom and asked how to cook lima beans the southern way, which from my experience is cooked to mush consistency and tasting like meat. i went to publix and bought the beans and a smoked ham hock and went home and here's what it looked like.



i think i might be a little closer to being southern now.

job prayers & updated firsts gallery

so i saw a posting for a job as a substance abuse counselor on my counselor education list serv and decided to apply for it. it's a temporary job until next summer, starting soon, and after speaking with the person in charge of hiring, he seemed to think that if i were selected, they could work around my current schedule until i graduate, at which point i could resume full time. if i got this job it would mean a couple things:

1) bye bye free time and having a stress-free last semester
2) hello extra income
a) pay off debt quicker
b) save up money for house/move to colorado/camera lenses/bike for david

it'd be perfect because it is temporary and we want to move anytime after i graduate. this would really be more convenient since our lease goes til May 1. i'm sure we could extend it one month, it'd really be doing the landlord a favor, renting an extra summer month.

anyway, i really want this to be a God thing and not a forced thing on my part. so would you be praying for me that God would do what he does best and leave it up to him. the other prayer would be that if i were offered the job, they would allow me to work 20 hours a week until i graduate, and at that point switching up to 40. it isn't the highest paying job ever at 30K, but it definitely would be helpful where we are right now.

also, check out the gallery, i've updated the firsts album with more pics.

love, jemma

The Pink Car

bad part - boooooooooooooooo



good part - yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

So Stink came up and we worked on the Pink Car this weekend. It died on me on the way home a couple of weeks ago, an apparent ignition failure. About 4 years ago I had installed a MSD 6A w/ Blaster 3 coil when the stock igniter failed (stupid internal coil...great idea Mazda). So I assumed it was something with that system, and it seems like it was. Apparently now you don't have to use the $180 MSD box, you can use a $15 GM HEI module that does about the same thing. Ahh, the joys of progress.

So we installed that HEI module with the new wiring scheme and it starts and idles fine, and it will drive pretty well. Until you go wide open on it, at which point it misfires and chokes out (leaving a nice cloud of black smoke from the unburned fuel). So now we're thinking the coil might be bad too, and they didn't have MSD Blaster 3 coils at the local auto parts store. So I'm going to order one of those this week and we should be back at 100% sometime this week.

Good thing is we fixed the accessory belt that I had let squeak for the last year. Yeah, I'm lazy with the car maintenance but it's so stinking hard when you don't have a garage. Or a carport. Or a paved driveway. And we eliminated the MSD 6A box for an easily replaceable HEI module. And we eliminated alot of potential problems moving forward, which is cool. For more pics of our fun with Stink, click here.

-David

stinky is here & beach retreat

The Stink is here helping us figger out what is wrong with the pink car. He picked us up in Daytona on his way up to Gainesville which made for a better 2nd half of the trip up for him (so I like to think) and we got to hang out with him extra that we wouldn't normally get to :-) woot!

David and I were in Daytona Beach for the Beach Retreat with our church and a few other churches in our family of... churches... man that is a lot of church in one sentence!

We stayed overnight in a very juicy hotel called El Caribe right on the beach and spent some time in worship, which I helped to lead singing and playing my tambourine. No seriously, I play the tambourine. And the egg maracas. We also got to hear a few teachings from a visiting pastor in our network of churches throughout the nation and the world. This particular guy was from Denver, CO. David and I were particularly interested in that because we think we might like to move there sometime. We also got some quality time with our home groups which are smaller groups within our church who get together each week to hang out and study the bible. It was a good time.

Stink got there just in time for the baptisms and I took a few photos of that and of the cute children running around. Check out the photos from the beach retreat here. The beach retreat was lotsa fun and we're both really pooped. That didn't stop David and Stink from attacking the pink car's distributor cap with a soldering iron. They managed to get the car to start, but there seem to be other issues... hmmm... (maybe David can fill you in!).

So we hit Third Place Pub & Grille for dinner - tasty tasty and headed home. The boys are watching TV right now and I'm giving updates on the GA vs. BAMA game. I'm thinking about going to bed real quick like. Definitely check back for updates on the pink car and maybe some more photos!