![]() What an amazing day it is to be alive. I feel awake, excited and nervous for what the future holds for me and the changes that are coming to my business. Which says a lot considering I haven’t felt that for months. For Months I have felt numb, swimming in a sea of confusion and lost loneliness. Over the past several months I have dedicated my time to getting me mentally healthy by overcoming depression and learning to live with my anxiety. I have been healing from a state of feeling “broken” helped me to realize things that I want to change in many areas of my life and what areas of focus will bring me the most joy. Moving forward my focus will be on female photography both teen and adults, helping them to see what truly amazing people they are inside and in their body. Which means I will no longer be offering wedding photography effective immediately. One of the boundaries and goals that I established for myself and business is that I am going to take time to vacation with my family. However, I don’t have the ability to plan family vacations during wedding season (summer) when my children are on their vacation because couples have specific dates set. With that being said, I am very excited for this transition in my business because it gives me the freedom to spend more time with my children during their vacations. I will continue offering Couples portraits because I absolutely love working with couples. Through my boudoir studio I will also be offering couples boudoir sessions. It is an amazing way for a couple to relight the spark after the craziness of everyday life stresses. As a woman, mother and a wife I know first-hand that we get lost in the titles of what we do and the spark in our relationship tends to dull over time. We feel less desired and less sexy as time goes on. Having a couple’s boudoir session reinstates the fact that we are still sexy in the new body we have! We are still desired and appreciated and loved. I will continue working with High School Seniors. It is important to me for teen girls to see that high school is just a moment and that there is so much more to life than the pressures of the tabloids. Mentoring young girls has becoming my heart and soul over the past couple of years and I am excited to be able to spend more time getting to do this. I am so excited spend my time focusing on women. Helping them overcome their own feelings of “broken”. Overcoming the feeling of not being enough. Not being sexy or worthy. I am excited to spend my time dedicated to helping women see themselves through honest eyes! xoxo Ash
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Ashlie Tate Photography Boudoir & Glamour is hosting an ALL women's Self-love Retreat!!!![]() Hello Gorgeous!! Congratulations and I am so very proud of you for letting yourself put you first! As a mother, a wife or even just a female adult we tend to have the need and desire to put the needs and wants of others first, however, this retreat is all about YOU! It is about learning to love and celebrate the woman you have become in the body that you have! The Wapiti Self-Love Women’s Retreat is a two-night getaway in the Mountains of Wapiti, Wyoming where you will receive the opportunity to unplug (if you so choose), recharge and focus on you, both nights include a catered dinner, stocked kitchen for self-serve breakfast and lunch, a 30-minute massage, swag bag and a one hour boudoir session complete with professional and makeup for each woman, your ordering premier will be scheduled for a later date and take place in studio (130 North 30th Street Billings, Montana). The retreat check-in will be March 27, 2020 and check-out March 29, 2020. As mentioned it will take place at a tranquil location on the outskirts of Wapiti, Wyoming sitting on eleven acres proving the opportunity to take a quite walk to clear your head if you so choose, do some yoga on the deck or just unwind from the hustle of everyday life. There is limited availability of six women to keep the experience intimate and tranquil. as mentioned each woman will receive a one hour boudoir session which can be indoor, outdoor, bathtub (which is STUNNING) or a combination. I recommend three outfit choices and will be in much deeper contact with those who book to go through the preparing and planning process. The Retreat is booked on a first come basis and is non-refundable. Investment: $800 if paying in full or 3 payments of $300. Products or digitals are not included in the investment cost of the retreat and are purchased at a later date during your ordering premier. Payment is due at the time of booking to secure your spot. Once secured a contract will be emailed to you to be completed. As always please email me if you have any questions or to secure you spot: atpboudoirglamour@yahoo.com Please notify me of any allergies/diet restrictions at booking/inquiry so that I can plan accordingly. ![]() Hey there! Because you know every letter should start with a hey, hi or hello. I have thought about this letter many times and the things I wanted to include within the letter itself and the biggest thing I could come up with was an I am sorry from the bottom of my heart. Truth be told 2019 broke me, like literally broke me. I had a breakdown in August that landed me in therapy once a week, which is all in all for the best and not at all a bad thing in any way. I found out a lot about many of the people thought to be closest to me and learned a ton about myself. Sadly, it all came at the sacrifice of my mental health. I learned that I have the, actually I have been working on it for a few months now so the correct term is that I HAD the inability to tell people no in fear of disappointing them, which put myself in a state of being extremely over extended physically and mentally. This year I will be focusing on getting back to the basics of when my studio began, because that it when it brought me the most joy. It will be about having an amazing experience, creating friendships and capturing emotionally moving images. There will be set days of the week for sessions, as well as studio hours for ordering appointments and meeting. Sunday’s and Monday’s are my off days and I will be starting to take VACATION time for family. I know it’s crazy to think that I even need to put this out there in writing but it for a few different reasons. One self-employed people often work all the time and speaking from experience have a fear of taking time off because what will their clients think. While family photography is not a focus for my studio I am still very much a wife and mom to three amazing kids that need to see and have time with me while they are on their vacation times from school as well. I will be taking major holidays to be with them and no longer responding to Facebook messages, text messages or emails on holidays. I know many reading this are probably thinking well of course you are taking the holiday to be with your family that’s common sense. But the truth is that I actually get messages and texts on major holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving asking me to post photos or even schedule a session on Christmas Eve. Over the past few years I have gotten in the mindset that if I do not respond to these messages and communications and requests at that exact moment or post said requested photos at that moment, or schedule that Christmas eve session that I will be disappointing someone and my heart can’t take the feeling of disappointment. Then I stepped back and realized that I was (unknowing to them) disappointing my babies by not being the best me I can be. I am not longer providing the best service I can provide on the post session because I am stretched far too thin. I am working on this and putting boundaries in place to prevent this in the future. My photography studio is my dream and I know these delays have set it back but I thank you for showing me grace over the past year as I have had to overcome the most difficult year of my life. Again, there are no other words that I can say besides I am sorry for and all missed/delayed communications and much slower turnaround times. Your images deserve to be the same level of beautiful wonderfulness you hired me for and rushing them would be a disservice to you and leave you disappointed in so many ways. My heart is too big to take you being disappointing with the images you’ll have for a lifetime. Amongst everything already mentioned, I vow to return to being raw with everyone. I have alway been a big believer that the biggest difference that you will get between me and another photographer is, ME! Over the past year to year and a half I have struggled more than anyone would ever guess with anxiety and depression. I have lost my light and my smile. I tell my husband that I smile but he reminds me "but its not your real one"! You know what guys? He's right? This year I vow to put myself back out there and be raw. Much like everyone else in society....I am far from perfect. I hate being venerable. I have a strong sense that everyone needs to believe that I have it all together and that I am strong and independent. But a VERY good friend recently reminded me that even superman has to wash his cap sometimes. I struggle with depression and I hide it behind a smile. But my boundaries for the business are to help me fight back my anxiety, depression and re-find my smile. The people you see below are my driving force! The are my happiness. I'd Like to introduce you to my husband Bryan. He is my High school sweetheart but so much more, I actually met him when I was 9 and that's a blog post for another time. My beautiful strong spirited hunting buddy is my oldest daughter Brooke. She has the biggest heart and far to grown up for her age. That little man...that's my boy Adyan! That boy is the first to be in a fight to defend someone else getting bullied and has the kindest heart you will find in an eight year old. Lastly the littlest munchkin is my mini me! Tinley is a spit-fire with a soft heart. She's strong willed and stubborn but wants to help. Guys I may not specialize in family or children photography but these four right here are my everything. If you stuck with my through the end of this, thank you and I hope you learned a little about me, my driving force (my family), and changes coming to my studio. ![]() Hey y’all! Year after year I keep saying, THIS is the year that I am going to start blogging. The year comes and goes and the Blog stays, well unblogged, completely untouched and all the memories and funny moments left to be just that, memories. With that being said, THIS is the year! This is the first official blog post and what better topic than a get to know Ashlie post. I have taken many workshops and conferences that say remember that your about you really quite frankly is nothing about you and is everything about your client and what you can do for them. Personally, I say screw that because it’s not all about what I can give you but more so how we can click and jive as a team to create awesomeness! Truth be told I’ve had people not book me because of my personality and I am one hundred thousand percent okay with that. I will always be one hundred percent unapologetically ME. I’m guessing by this point you might be wondering okay, okay so what make you so different from every other joe blow with a camera. Well, quite frankly I am raw! I love unconditionally and wholeheartedly. Everything I do is done with passion, and more often than not, I often forget that it is usually a good idea to walk before I run. I am a free spirit personality, who loves nothing more than to have fun and look for ways I can help and give back. How can I leave the world a better place than when I arrived? I do this through my career, through photography! I specialize in three main areas but that’s not to say that I will not photograph other things. My three specialties are High School seniors, typically girls but not exclusively, Couples and Boudoir (men, women and couples). In an effort for you to better get to know me I am going to break each one of these down for you as to why I specialize in these areas. I’m willing to bet by the end of this you will feel like we have known each other for years. So for starters, High School seniors, boy that’s a good one. Well, that’s actually a crazy one! More often than not I get comments such as “Ugh, I don’t know how you do it. So much drama” “Teens these days are so disrespectful. Wouldn’t children be more fun?”, “How do you manage to stay sane working with that many teenage girls? So much drama, hormones, shallowness etc.”. Truth be told, I LOVE this age group!! I could never imagine a world where I did not work with this age group. I get to help shape the way these girls act and treat each other for years to come. Why do I have a passion for this? Because I’ve lived that life already. I’ve been the least popular girl, the one who was bullied for dressing differently. Mind you differently was dressing country in California. I was the tallest in my class so of course that was another negative thing in middle school. HELLO….super models are freaking tall as crap! However, at the preteen/teenage years they are not thinking about that so it wasn’t a factor that made me cool or popular. I was and still am a VERY outspoken person. This brought me the number three spot on a shooting hit list my freshman year of high school. Not a fun this to experience in anyway. To know that someone disliked me so much because I was different that they would rather see me dead is a thought that never leaves me. I was a cheerleader, STILL NOT POPULAR, ironic though because cheerleaders are the popular ones, right? Wrong, not every cheerleader is popular! Working with this age group I help the girls that I work with to realize that stereotyping is 99.9% of the time wrong! In the spring of 2018, I started signing 2018 seniors for my revamped VIP Team. It is a team that is designed to bring girls together from all different walks of life on one team without stereotyping. The first year was full of learning for sure but they helped me grow as a person. Come spring of 2019 we had our VIP Team for 2020 Senior’s and 2020 Junior Ambassadors and they all could come from different walks of life. We meet once a month for themed photo shoots, events and other fun things. I get to help mentor these girls as they work on the creation of the SAP Project. The SAP Project is a Suicide Awareness & Prevention Project created by these girls. It will be the legacy that we will keep going with the future ambassador and VIP teams. It shows them that while they are all from different walks of life they all have things in common; they all have their own struggles and triumphs. I am passionate about my girls because I get to watch them grow into young adults. I get to watch and help them grow, and when they leave, they always take a piece of my heart with them and forever have a special place in my heart. I love unconditionally and with all my being. I used to think of it as a fault because I would get emotionally invested, but then I realized it's not a downfall, it’s a strength that some may never know. A special ability to be able to connect with this age group on a different level because they don’t view me as THAT ADULT. I get to be a support system for some, a shoulder to lean on, a listening ear and a voice of reason. A safe place if they ever feel like, in our overwhelming world, they don’t have one to call their own. Basically, if I’m going off the workshops version of my about me being about what I can do for or offer you or your senior. The answer is most honestly answered by simply saying me, that’s what I have to offer you! My unwavering devotion to each of these kids I get to work with to know that they have someone in their corner, someone to adventure with, someone to support their dreams and goals, someone to push them to succeed, and someone to be a listening ear if they ever need it. It today’s world, it takes a village people, it takes a village and I am always honored when I get to be part of your village and have an impact on the life of your child. |
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