Happy Helps with Ashley B.

I am so excited for today's post and to introduce you to Ashley.  I have asked Ashley to be a regular contributor to this blog and now once a month she is going to grace all of us with her beautiful words, helpful tips, and lovely life musings.  She takes a moment to introduce herself so I won't spend too long on it but I just have to say that I have known Ashley for several years and I truly think of her as one of the prettiest ladies
I've ever known in real life.

See what I mean?  And she is also a very talented photographer who is finally taking her skills and turning them into a business.  Many of her posts will be focused on photography (but she'll have lots of other things to share as well).  She takes simply lovely pictures.

You can follow her on Facebook and on her photography blog. I am really excited for this new element and all that she will add to this blog. That's enough from me, I'll turn it over to her now!

why hello darlings!

i can't tell you how excited i have been since brie asked me to guest post here on darling doodles.  hopefully it will be as much fun for you as it is for me!

let me introduce myself.  my name is ashley broomall, i hail from a small town in northern arizona and am currently living way out in east texas with my hubby and three children. that's two boys and one sweet baby girl to be exact.  i adore my babies and i cherish my life as a mother.  for the past several years i have been on a mission to simplify my life and to relish in the small and beautiful things that God places before me on a daily basis.  these moments can be as small as glancing out my back window and finding the three-year-old gliding airplane style on a swing all by his lonesome or peeking in on the five-year-old as he sounds out his latest school book with a furrowed brow and pure determination across his face.  and of course some of the best moments of my day revolve around snuggling baby girl and watching as her eyelids slowly give in to sleep.  it's nothing grand, especially when you are speeding through your day or caught up in a million to-do's, but i find when i am still, the little things touch my heart and i am filled with joy.  and those are the moments and memories that i hold to when i'm having one of those pull-my-hair-out kind of days.

i am passionate about catching these small moments and keeping them.  not just for myself, but for my children and their children.  up until recently i have only considered myself to be a very devoted mom-tographer with a far fetched dream of one day becoming a professional.  but i turned over a new leaf this year!  it's the kind of brave little leaf that teaches you to believe in yourself and just go for it.  i am now throwing myself into the world of photography and hoping to find my place in it.  ultimately i would love to be able to make a name for myself as a lifestyle photographer.  posed and planned pictures are nice and wonderful to have, but my heart pitter patters over the photos that capture the heart and soul of people.  i am new on this scene and i learn new things everyday and improve myself with every photo session.  i am so excited to pursue this dream of mine and i would love to share some of the things that i have learned with you.  there are so many things i wish i had picked up on sooner as i documented the growth of our family.

for example, i remember my first days and weeks and months of being a new mom.  i must have snapped over two hundred photos in the first eight days of the now five-year-old's life.  they were all relatively similar.  close ups of his sweet face, highlighted by the shiny flash of my little sony point and click.  to this day i carry around the guilt of how many times i must have flashed that poor sleeping child.  so today we'll keep it simple and i will share with you this lesson, it's rude to flash.  take advantage of all the natural light you can get.  by simply moving the direction of your camera, you can find light you never knew was there.  don't be afraid to experiment, especially in your own home.  find the places where you get the best light, pay attention to how the sunlight enters your home throughout the day.  i have what i call sweet spots in my home.  they change hourly but i have made myself accustom to them.  for example, when the three-year-old decided that his baby sister needed a hat on her head at nine o'clock in the morning, i knew that the light pouring in my bedroom at that hour would make for a beautiful photo.  it's small things like this that will make all the difference as you try to catch those special moments of your own.

so that is a start and i will be back next month with more happy helps.  i think we'll have a fantastic time together, keeping it simple of course.

happy friday!

xoxo.ash