How
I Spent My Christmas Vacation - 2004
By: Matt Talley
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Christmas holiday 2004 was one of flying, road-tripping, family, adventure,
laughs, and exhaustion. Laurel and I flew to Arizona to spend time with
her family and I did a little hiking and running while there. Next, we flew
to Arkansas and spent a day and a night with friends before picking up my
children for a little drive (6 hours) to have late Christmas at my mother’s
house. There were gifts, playgrounds, arcades, go-carts, and other kid-friendly
(Have I ever mentioned that I am only three-years-old???) activities. After
dropping the babies off, we stayed another night with friends and then flew
to Colorado for the New Years Celebration, snowboarding, and some “casual”
snow-shoeing. After all that, there was a mad rush back to Orange County,
15 hours of sleep/coma and then off to work and school again the very next
day. Below are some of the pictures from our trip and notes about when and
where and why they were taken. |
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This
is a wide shot of Flat Iron Mountain in Arizona. Laurel’s dad and
I summited it one afternoon shortly before Christmas Day. |
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The
actual peak |
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picture of Laurel's dad and Ion the summit. Hold the curser over the picture
for a view of us not too much later. |
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Just
me on top of the Mountain. Why the gaiters... cactus thorns! |
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A
bloom in the face of adversity. This plant was snapped off, probably in
high wind, before it could flower at full height. The little guy just sprouted
with what was left. You can see the peak of the mountain in the background. |
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| This
is one of those same plants in all of its full glory. I had to splice three
different pictures together to get it all in because the thing was so tall
- maybe twenty-five feet. |
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This
was the entire mountain as seen from the trail. |
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A
montage of family pictures: Laurel and Carlton goofing around. Madison,
Me, Carlton, Mother, my sister, my nephew at Christmas; Carlton and Madison
opening gifts. |
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A
note that we left on the wall of a pub that a friend frequents. The ladies
like him anyway and we thought it might just make it that much better
for him. |
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A
buddy let us stay at his place for a couple of nights and we left him
some "presents" before we left. I won't go into what the note
said, but |
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Where's
me Lucky Charms?!? New Years Eve in a cabin in the mountains of Colorado! |
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| Boarding
on New Years Day. A two year old tradition that I aim to keep every year.
It was REALLY cold that day and the conditions were very icy, but we all
had a blast! |
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Picks
from snow-shoeing the next day. |
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Two
medium-sized children making snow angels. |
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| A
buddy after a long couple of days. He loves his cell phone like a teddy
bear and curled up next to it for comfort as he passed out in the floor
from playing too hard. |
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A fox that we saw while snow-shoeing. |
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