​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

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.
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