Another post

I love music. And reading. And the news. But not politics.
And I love food. And spices.
I love nature. And walking. I love Jack, my dog. He has one eye. I love fire. Fireplaces are nice and cozy. I love the rain. I love big windows. I love long drapes. I like fleece blankets and homemade hot chocolate. I like smooth sheets and my fleece poncho.
I love singing talent shows like American Idol and The X-Factor. I love when people achieve their dreams.
I love Portland. I love short nails with dark nail polish. I like watching people who are in love interact with each other.
I love my niece. I love dimples.
I love diversity.
I love dramatic television shows. I love crying while watching dramatic television shows. I love watching LOST with my mom.
I like cooking sliced apples in coconut oil and coconut milk with Cinnamon and craisins. Yum.
I love the ocean. I love rivers. Water is good. I love trees. And green is my favorite color.

I love the realization of being a part of something bigger than myself. Like when I was in the symphonic band in high school. We won State my sophomore and junior year. Or like when I served my mission. We took the glad news to the South. Or like when I helped feed the homeless. Or when I heard baby Perry cry as she came into this world. Or when I touched my dad's lifeless body, cold and pale, with my small finger, but still felt his spirit beside me. I love the gospel. Because it's a mix of hope, truth, faith, reality, and the unknown. I love God, because I do. He loves me.

I love the guitar. And I love making percussion sounds in between strumming by hitting my palm on the wood of the guitar. I love singing.
I love listening to my brother sing. I love watching Kayleen smile at her baby when her baby wakes up from a nap. I love how Bobby works hard for his family. I love watching my mom knit. I love hearing Chuck laugh hard, because it rarely happens. When it does, it's priceless. I love reminiscing with Crystal Marley about watching Seinfeld. I love watching movies and eating ice cream with Matt, Penny, Ellie, Luke and Ben. I love the tenderness each one of those kids possesses. I love how Luke will walk up to me, hug me, and walk away. I love watching Ben snuggle up to his big sister, Ellie.
I love looking through pictures of my best friends from my childhood. I like seeing their children and how much their children look like them.
I love to write.
I love remembering.
I love journals.
I love exploring thought. I like empathy.
I love BYU-Idaho. And good professors.

I love life. And skipping. And jumping on trampolines.

This feeling is all too familiar.

I understand this song.


I can't wait to see her live in a few days. She captures experiences with such raw emotion.

I can't express enough...

How much I love paleo. I really do. It's such good food. Why is it good food? Because it's REAL food. It's natural food. It's light food. It's pure and flavorful food. I'm not sure where in our history the processed crap we get in boxes passed as actual food, but it's not. And I'm glad I've figured that out. Also, paleo exercises. Lift heavy things, walk, jump, run, climb, enjoy being active. It all makes so much sense. I love it.

Favorite paleo recipe blog HERE
Favorite paleo explanation blogs HERE and HERE
FAVORITE paleo podcast (and my favorite paleo media source over any other) HERE

Happy birthday to me!

A little late, I know.

But look what Santa (AKA, the mail wo/man) delivered to me today!!!



It's a beaut. It's my birthday/Christmas/Grad school gift to myself. I'm a writer...getting a Master's in Journalism. I NEEEEEEED a good laptop. :)

So now I have absolutely no excuses for not busting out my book. This is better than ice cream!

P.S. It's snowing in Portland. That's the delicious cherry on top of my laptop! :)

This is a first.

I never make resolutions for the new year. I never write them down. I rarely ever say them out loud. The farthest I'll sometimes go is glossing over a few things in my mind. But I don't like to be specific, as to not feel like a failure when I know I won't achieve them.

Well, this year is different. I definitely will fail when I believe I won't achieve. Writing is a way of committing. That's why I love writing. It's a form of true commitment. Commitment to your actions. Commitment to your thoughts. Commitment to your feelings. Putting pen to paper is a way of producing physical evidence of your inner thoughts, desires and emotions.

So, I have put pen to paper this year, and now I am putting fingers to keyboard. :) I have verbally read these out loud to my family, and I am now displaying them for all of you to see out in cyber world.

Physical:

I hope to be two sizes down by the end of 2012. If I shrink even more, great. But two sizes is my resolution. I want to be stronger, and I want to have more stamina in order to more thoroughly enjoy hikes and outdoor activities. The following points will help me achieve my physical desires.

1)I will exercise using my own body weight 2-3 times a week (sometimes using free weights), while doing some form of low-intensity cardio (walking, biking, rowing) for 3-5 hours per week. For more about this visit Mark Sisson's website here. Just click on the Primal Blueprint Fitness Ebook to the right.

2)I will be following a paleo eating plan. Click here to understand more about that.I've been eating this way since August 2011, so don't think I'm kidding myself here. It's not that difficult.

3)I will get at least 8 hours of sleep per night.

I believe it's important to have physical goals. Not for vain purposes, but to always be growing, improving and becoming the healthiest you. I'm not the healthiest me right now. I could be stronger. I could be faster. I could be happier. (And my physical state correlates closely with my happiness. When I'm eating healthy things that were created by God to give me nourishment, I feel better...every way you look at it. Also, moving around...taking a walk...exercising helps me feel happier.) I feel, if I only work on my spiritual self, and not my physical self, that's only rowing one paddle of a canoe, and I'm going in circles. God gave me this physical body for a reason. I need to keep it healthy so my spiritual self has no reason to get deterred.

Spiritual:
I hope to be closer to the Savior, to have a better relationship with Him, and to trust my Heavenly Father more. I'd like to be more patient with the people around me, more loving and more understanding. I want to be much slower to anger or get frustrated (which goes along with patience.) And I want to have the same belief in myself that my Heavenly Parents have in me. I want to feel Their belief in me, and, from that, produce my own faith in myself. The following points will help me achieve my spiritual desires.

1)I would like to have read the Book of Mormon by the end of the year, and all the Standard Works (Old and New Testament, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price) by the time I'm 30. This involves me reading from the Book of Mormon and one other scripture on a daily basis. I still need to do the calculations to know exactly how to pull it off.

2)Something I stole from my friend Crystal Miller's blog...I want to work on a Christ-like attribute or commandment a month. I stole the monthly idea from her. My bishop has said that it can be overwhelming and kind of a downer when we think about all we want to improve on. But if we just work on one...one until we become excellent at it, then it's not so overwhelming. So, I'm going to pick something monthly. One month it may be scripture study...I'll study extra hard, keeping notes, looking up definitions and meanings, exploring the history. The next month may be temple attendance...for that month I'll attend once a week. One month it might be morning prayers, and the next month I'll focus extra hard on humility. I'm hoping by the end of the year I'll be a lot stronger in 12 commandments/Christ-like attributes.

3)I want to attend the temple once a month. Along with this, I'd like to visit some sort of beauty in nature once a month, the ocean, a waterfall, a hiking trail...and take time to sit and ponder.

4)Have actual conversations with my Heavenly Father. I don't want to just talk at Him. I want to listen.

5)This one is a wee bit personal, but I want to write everything out. So, I want to completely stop thinking/saying swear words. I'm not a big swearer. Those words aren't part of my normal verbal vocabulary. But, they do creep up in my mind pretty often...and seem to slip out during major frustration, pain or anger. I don't want those words to be in my thoughts any longer. I want to refine myself...my thoughts, desires, and actions. I want to know that if the Savior were next to me, I'd feel comfortable...not awkward and uncomfortable. So, I want to eliminate these words. There's really no point to them...especially if I'm working on being more patient and slow to anger. I believe fasting and prayer is the solution to this dilema. I'm seriously going to work hard on eliminating any swearword from my thoughts this year.

Other:
Improve my writing skills and take it to the next level:professional. I want to write a book by the time I'm 30, and I want to write at least one article this year and get it published in a magazine...and preferably get paid for it. :) I'd also like to improve my cooking abilities...understand different seasonings and spices and how to improve mundane dishes.

1)Write for at least a half hour every day. The subject doesn't matter so much as I focus on the quality and content of my words.

2)Create outlines for possible story ideas.

3)Carry out interviews I've wanted to do with specific people for the past two years.

4)Have 100 pages written toward the book by the end of the year.

5)Learn a new recipe a month and execute it.

6)Cook weekly, try new things...don't stick to the same paleo cookbook I've been using for the past 5 months.

So, these are my goals and resolutions. I know I can accomplish them. I won't stress; I'll just keep going, taking it one day at a time. Life is good. I will find the good and I will make it good.

Story time

Once upon a time, I was in the singles ward. Aka, the special ward. And once upon a time, that meant we didn't get to rotate meeting times each year like every other ward. So once again, like once upon a time, I get to attend 1:30 p.m. church. Let me tell you how I really feel.......

I'm going on strike to get my Sunday afternoon naps back.

Goodbye 2011

I'm not gonna lie. Two Thousand and Eleven was not an easy year for me. It was hard. I've been living at home for the entire year. It was a year of fear, worry, dread and unknowing. I had no money. I was in the hole a bit. I needed to save and figure life out. I changed my mind so many times. One minute I was preparing to teach English in Taiwan. The next I was looking for a job outside of Oregon. The next I was planning on moving to Tennessee to pursue music (I was seriously considering it.) Then finally I settled on Grad school. But I only applied to one, because the thought of preparing to apply to more than one overwhelmed me. Luckily, I made it in. I feel good about it. I finally have direction.

But, as I look back on 2011, it wasn't all bad. In fact, a LOT of great things took place. Here are some photos documenting the good times...in order of when they took place. :)

1) My brother and I put our money together and bought some good recording equipment for a home studio. We've loved it.

2) I took a trip back to my mission. MJM, baby! It was a blast.

Bro Kevin, cousin Paul and I all tried out for American Idol! It was so much fun. None of us made it past the first round (this season had better be GOOOOOD :)), but the experience was a blast. It was so fun having Paul visit and wandering the streets of downtown Portland with him. Good times for sure.

Made a few trips to visit the hermana up in Seattle before baby Perry joined us. Good stinkin' times.

And while in Seattle I discovered my new favorite chocolate: Theo's Coconut Curry. YUM.

I went to the Sara Barielles concert all by my lonesome. It was a FABULOUS experience. Freeing to do something I wanted to do, on my own...no one holding my hand. And it's honestly one of the best concerts I've ever been to. Even better than SOME of the Amy concerts I've attended. SOME...not all. :)

I finally went to VooDoo doughnuts for the first time in my life! I can now call myself a true Portlander...ever though I was raised here. :) My good pals Missy and Julia accompanied me.

My hermana helped me get a make-over...new hair, new clothes...and she's a big inspiration for the weight I've lost. I started living a paleo lifestyle and working out more. So far I've lost 20 lbs...would be more, but the holidays killed me. I'm back on track though, and I'm counting on losing even more this year (I got a late start last year. :))

Baby Perry Willow Ulrich was born, August 25th, 2011!!! One of the coolest experiences of my life was hearing her first cries alongside my brother from out in the hall. Nope...I wasn't in there, and I'm glad I wasn't. :) I did get to hear everything, though.

AMY GRANT concert!!!! First one in 7 years. It was FAB.

The Thanksgiving trip to the snowy lake was great. Great time for reflection. Great beauty. Peaceful. Family time. Good trip all around.

My friend, Karen Brucker, won tickets to a private concert with Snow Patrol and invited me to tag along. SUPER fun.

I was able to witness Perry's first Christmas. She's so adorable. I love her to freakin' pieces.

I ended the year with the greatest birthday I've ever had. A bunch of my friends and family gathered together and made over 160 sack lunches. Several of us went downtown and passed them ALL out to the homeless. Very cool experience. It did leave me with a desire to do more, though. I'm thinking I'll do a lot more work with the homeless in the future. Good times though...good times for sure.

So, while 2011 was a hard year, it was a super good year as well. I'm very grateful for the experiences I had and the joy I felt. I can't wait to see what 2012 brings. Stay tuned for my 2012 resolutions! Happy New Year!