colleen's blog

2009-11-20T11:32:00.001-08:00

memorial for gwennie tomorrow at 11...lunch afterwards at my parent's.
for details e-mail me:

colleenpolice@gmail.com

"For with You is the fountain of life,
in Your Light we see light"

Psalm 36:9

2009-11-15T14:14:00.000-08:00

Gwenyth June Adams

July 3, 2008 ~ November 14, 2009

we are so grateful that you are the Lord's, and that you are with Jesus

in your full and perfect glory with Him

who made you so lovely.

i love you and miss you ceaselessly

the day can't come soon enough when i will see you again, little bug.

2009-11-14T15:29:00.001-08:00

hey everyone, please be praying for gwennie...a few days ago she got very sick, and she's been in the hospital since yesterday. they diagnosed her with pnemonia and about an hour ago they admitted her to the ICU. i don't know if it's H1N1...she is very susceptible and weak, so please lift up prayers of healing for gwen, and strength for joey, ginger and caid...thank you...

give a caid a camera...

2009-11-10T18:30:00.000-08:00

A couple sundays ago some of the fam went to deerfield after church. i took some pictures of caid with the beaded curtain...

some sort of animal, naturally...

joey had tea. caid decided he wanted some. so joey said,

"here, this is how you drink it. take a sip like this. now, it's warm, okay?"

caid obviously felt pretty good about this.

so he took a sip.

aaaand promptly spit it out.

not so good.

reminded me of the asparagus incident...

now! to the purpose of this post.

i gave caid my camera to take some pictures with...and this is what he saw:

(love the self-portraits)

(i took this one. he's making a fish face)

love this "series"

(mommy and sister)

(grandpa floyd series)

food arrived, and i took the camera back.
in chinese restaurants like this one, they give you orange slices for dessert.
and then i took these. because i had to.

the end!

Look to the East!

2009-11-02T17:09:00.000-08:00

Got my east coast pictures up on facebook!!

here are the public links...

Volume 1 (Manhattan, Boston and Mystic)

Volume 2 (Annapolis)

Enjoy!

ps...happy november. life update soon...promise.

real quick takes...

2009-10-02T21:25:00.000-07:00

a Warrior's themed party at my friend Cassandra's apartment

big nasty amazing spider that's been living in front of our house for 2 weeks

friends hanging out in my new apartment

cam

caid and cam

caid

alex and cam

the braces twins...but not for long!! cam gets his off next week (so the rumors say)

hey, guess what, amaris and i going to new york in the morning. my plane leaves at 7:25 am from LAX. we'll also be going to boston and connecticut. then i'll be visiting laurel and chad in annapolis. you should pray for the trip...that would be radical.

and hey aren't you glad i did this post just for you when i should be packing?

babes, picnics, tapirs.

2009-09-21T02:41:00.000-07:00

well, to put it simply, my days have become not only increasingly more and more (redundantly redundant) busy, but i swear, simultaneously shorter and shorter. i just don't have enough time to do even everything that needs to be done. like blogging! because i know you all set your calendars to my posts.

real quick...of late developments:
2 new jobs: background painter for warner bros., and substitute teacher at maranatha
moving on friday. new apartment! and i haven't even started packing!
large portrait commission in the works
traveling back east in less than 2 weeks
running a lot...up to 3 miles now!
trying to finish 2 other head drawings to enter into a show by the end of the month

and that's not even taking into account all the craziness going on around me with friends and family &c.
ok done updating.

so what am i doing up at 2:30 in the morning?
well, as much as i desperately need my sleep, i am instead lying awake in bed with a mind running 140 mph. because it doesn't seem to matter how tired i am...my brain will not shut down. it's ridiculous. and i'm trying not to get into the habit of taking my anti-anxiety meds before i go to bed every night :D

so i figured i might as well take advantage of the insomnia and be marginally productive. i've been meaning to post this stuff for a week.
therefore, i proudly present, some pictures and 4 amazing videos from last weekend!

birthday gathering for joey last saturday. lots of playing and wrestling on the lawn.
and cuteness.

Caid being a Tapir
(yes, a Tapir)

this one makes me smile

video of Caid pretending to be said Tapir:

Caid being a Water Bat
(yes, a Water Bat)

wondering what a water bat is? well, you can find out a bit about them in this video:

best line: "i live in the night!"

oh, and just in case you were wondering what water bats drink:

leaf!

playing with big brother

bare, charred san gabriel mountains :(

goofing around after church...

what's funny about this picture, is i have one of johnny and david doing the exact same thing when they were about 14 years old...i'll have to find it.

bob REALLY needs grandkids.

sunday afternoon picnic in the park!
i think joey, alec and jeff all just discovered bugs in their burgers.

oh, and by the way, Beatles Rock Band...

...is really fun.

night.

snapshots of the past few weeks

2009-09-05T17:16:00.000-07:00

Wildfire Chronicles Pt 1 & 2

2009-08-28T14:28:00.000-07:00

the fire in angeles crest is the closest i have ever been to something like this.

yesterday afternoon, driving right around the corner by the house, it looked like a volcano was coming to life in the san gabriel mountains...at this point the fire was still on the other side of the mountains and wasn't considered much of a threat.

yesterday evening as i drove out again this is what it looked like...bright orange flames mounting over the hillside...

a couple of hours later
flames that had to be over one hundred feet high were grazing down the mountains. it's hard to express how huge and terrifying the sight was when all i have is a blurry photo...

the news said last night that they had the fire 10% contained.

this morning i went outside the house and took this picture of the smoke from the front yard...

driving towards the place where i took the previous photos...

i rounded the corner and this is what greeted me:

apparently, overnight, the fire split into two directions and the firefighters lost what little control of it they had. they have issued mandatory evacuations for hundreds of homes in La Canada Flintridge

the most recent one i took, about an hour and a half ago.

listening to news radio, the fires are of course top stories. the fire in azusa is, thus far, 70 contained, and the fire in rancho palos verdes is 60% contained. finally, they mentioned the la canada fire (officially named the Station Fire), and said it is 0% contained.

praying for everyone who has had to leave their homes...

mimi's cafe

2009-08-25T16:17:00.000-07:00

wren, jeannie, carol and colleen are out to lunch with grandpa floyd. he is eating filet of sole...

jeannie: how's your fish, dad?

gp floyd: (thinks for a moment) well, as the hymn says, "it is well with my sole."

first things first: a really awesome night-cloud-shot...

2009-08-17T20:36:00.000-07:00

after-church lunch at wolf burgers

a Tarzan-watching Caid...

the-end

classic wren and cam

2009-08-09T22:03:00.000-07:00

Today, after church was over and the general socializing and talking etc. was done in the parking lot, we finally decided where to go for lunch (wolf burgers, interestingly). As we began to walk to our respective vehicles, Cam took Wren's arm in both his hands, pulled her towards their car and said: "Come on, Granny Sue, let's go."

kids.

2009-08-04T21:23:00.000-07:00

So...

Wren and Cam have been gone since Friday and i've been house sitting for them...which means that i've gotten to watch Caid and Gwen in the mornings!

Yesterday Caid was sitting on the couch looking

at an old Richard Scarry book (it even has Jeff's name in it from when he was little) as i was feeding Gwen. All of a sudden i heard him exclaim: "TRADER JOE'S!"

I walked over to him to see that he was looking at the page with all the things you find in a supermarket...displays of vegetables, scales, check-out aisles, racoons butchering steaks...

and i said, "Oh wow, it does look like Trader Joe's!"

Without removing his eyes from the page he replied insistently: "No, it is Trader Joe's!"

silly me.

Later, once Ginger had arrived to have lunch with them and take them home, i related the above anecdote. She laughed and said to Caid,

"Yeah, you like Trader Joe's, don't you?"

"Mm-hm," Caid replied with a mouthful of pb&j sandwich.

"What other places do you like to go?" Ginger then asked him.

Caid thought very seriously for a moment.
"Mmm," he pondered, "North America."

"North America??"

"Yeah!" he said. "With all the animals."

silly her.

well, here's what's been going on.

2009-08-03T16:38:00.000-07:00

Two weekends ago, Amaris and i had, what we call, a "creative isolation" weekend, where we stake out a spot, and don't really leave it for two days...and we just work. Her, on her novel, and me on whatever drawing project i have going at the time.

cats--not so much

At one point Amaris made herself a sandwich using some packaged deli meat and cheese...only to figure out about 1/3 of the way through eating it that she had forgotten to remove the paper from the cheese.

yep, she ate it.

Amaris working

me working

yaaay

The sad part to this story is that i ended up having to start my drawing over a few days later, because i went and made the heads bigger than i had measured out. I NEED TO NOT DO THAT.

Well, that's how we learn... :P

Caid expounding on the health-improving qualities of a good cobbler and ice cream.
...not really. i just like the way he's holding the spoon...

reid and cam playing croquet...

Oops, ice cream on the shoulder.

Water play at grammies! This was last week.

We had just watched the old Disney Swiss Family Robinson, and Caid was inspired by the scene where the older boy (Fritz?) wrestles a water snake.

So Caid wrapped himself in the hose and began squirming around in it yelling "help! hellllp! it's a water snake!!"

And grammie came to the rescue...beating the snake away!!

Caid also had to examine a brown furry beetle that was making weird hissing noises

poke

A few videos that actually accompany the post below...

whew

a few july videos

2009-07-29T15:48:00.000-07:00

first off, from the 4th of july...pip and reid trying to figure out a dance they saw on youtube...

secondly, from the biola conference, after jeff bishop tells us about his favorite G. K. Chesterton book, kelly enlightens us about some favorite "classics" of her own...

and this one, also from the biola conference is just plain happy. anna monarrez singing "down by the bay" with the kids (she's magical, i tell you), and the happiness that ensues. (caid's response, by the way, is something about "meat")

~

you sick of babies swimming in the pool yet? cuz i'm not.

2009-07-27T10:09:00.000-07:00

have you ever seen anyone so happy to eat a pb&j sandwich?

i really like this one

time to get sun-blocked

standing up!!

motorboat, motorboat

cam and gwennie

fun with mommy

aaaa! alligator!

if you're happy and you know it...

good'day

2009-07-25T19:01:00.000-07:00

praying. morning walk. cold pizza. cold coffee. classical music. drinking tea. drawing faces. reading stories.

Happy Wedding, Laura and Thad...

2009-07-18T14:57:00.000-07:00

7.18.09

why i have disappeard...

2009-07-17T23:22:00.001-07:00

~well, of course, there's the fact that i've been out of town a lot...retreats and stuff...
~holidays
~people visiting (memphis, san diego, richmond)
~healing from surgery (not moving around a lot for a while)
~looking for work (boooo)
~doing commissions (no spare time whatsoever)
~finding work (yaaaay)
~doctor's appointments (far, far away)
~preparing to move in the near future
~lots of praying (my strength)
~lots of writing (my stability)
~lots of reading (my sanity)
~trying to be with my family (we all need mutual support)
~sleeping (not staying up too late)
~exercising
~driving (everywhere. constantly.)
~planning trips for the fall
~SAVING $MONEY$ (very bad for social life)
~student loans and medical bills (very bad for saving money)
~getting ready for Laura's wedding

-shopping
-practicing song
-shopping
-chauffering bridesmaids
-flowers
-drinking coffee
-rehearsals

~TOMORROW is Laura and Thad's WEDDING
~dealing with my mentalness
~dealing with uncertainties
~next week...dealing with everything resulting from this stuff! :D

but it's been good to be busy.

maybe soon i'll see my friends again. super! call me.

~

right quick

2009-07-13T15:11:00.000-07:00

biola was an overwhelmingly deep pool of God's love, glory, and exhortation...a fact that has become more and more apparent, almost hour by hour since i came back home.

going online for the first time since returning from the retreat yesterday hit me with an immediate and surprisingly strong shock in that i realized how nauseated by this world i have become. the degradation of government, frivolity of hollywood, the idolatry of corruption, the blatant self-centered nastiness and worthlessness rampant on the time-waster that is facebook...

i find myself to be, at times, very impulsive. it is how i will write posts that a few hours later i delete. it is how i sometimes say things i immediately regret--and therefore often don't say much at all. it is how i wind up with shoes i don't like and shirts i don't wear.

yesterday i almost deleted my facebook account after being on it for all of 12 seconds.

then my brain (as it is finally beginning to do) kicked in before i acted on impulse and reminded me that facebook has provided me with vital networking, the ability to communicate with certain people, and also i am able to keep tabs on younger people i care about.

so i didn't. but i think i have a permanent averse-ness to it now, which is probably a good thing.

time to get going.

~

as reid so eloquently put it in his facebook status...

2009-07-08T10:03:00.001-07:00

"well, its no westmont, but biola here i come"

~

babies in [pool]water

2009-07-03T13:27:00.000-07:00

some pictures and videos of when joey brought the kids over to swim a few days ago...

gwennie wasn't really a fan at first...

bless you

joey, caid, gwen, grammie and anna

caid found a grasshopper in the pool...

and the ensuing video...

a little while before the video was taken, one of the dogs did, indeed, have a piece of poo stuck to her butt. what that had to do with the death of the grasshopper...? it's a mystery.

i almost gagged typing this

2009-06-30T12:51:00.000-07:00

Caid sneezes and wipes his nose with his hand, smearing a line of snot across his face.

Ginger: Uuugh. You've got a snot trail on your cheek!

Caid (happily): Like a snail!
.
.
.

(get it?)

finished my commission!

2009-06-28T15:46:00.000-07:00

a few months ago, i started this piece for Elizabeth...
i finally put the finishing touches on it last week and here it is! done :)

head on over to my art work blog to see more detailed pictures.

on Friday morning we arranged for me to deliver it to her...here are some pictures of her and the kids with the drawing...

James trying to get one of the babies to look at the camera...

i felt like such a basket case that morning...tired and slow...but Elizabeth gave me some coffee and just in time for me to leave i started feeling better! oh well. it was lovely talking to her for a bit...sitting in patio chairs on their new lawn, watching the boys swim and the twins play...Jewel made herself a cup of tea and pulled a chair out to sit near us.
a few more pictures from my time there...

all in all the whole process was an honor and a blessing. every chance i get to be able to make any sort of living doing what i love to do most is a gift straight from the hand of the Lord.
thank you, Elizabeth!

~

any movie entirely starring puppets that are not muppets is always doomed to be, on some level, unintentionally disconcerting.

2009-06-24T15:23:00.000-07:00

sarah, laura, mom and i at laura's wedding shower...

i went over to pip's one evening to hang out...here he is trying to get his dvd player to work so we can watch Thunderbird 6

here is a trailer for it:

AND HERE is one of the scenes in the movie...and also one of the creepiest things i have ever seen. no joke...this is exactly as it plays out in the film...

...

and of course,
BABIES!!!

caid assists his little sister...

joey cajoles caid to eat a bite of asparagus saying: "well, it looks like we don't have to worry about crows wanting this asparagus. i don't see any crows around. it's just sittin here. crows don't want asparagus. nope, it's totally safe."

but then the crows ATTACK!

this is awesome:
i took this video right after i took the pictures of caid eating the asparagus off the fork joey is holding out.
the beginning is my favorite part, purely for caid's amazing facial expressions...but the whole thing is great.

grammy

"2 snails and a squid" by caid

gwen munches on peach slices

and a letter to greenpeace.

that's all for the present!

~