A lot of thinking going on...

These past few weeks have been crazy to say the least! I find myself these days struggling to balance my family, my passion, and my emerging business. While I'm not an official business yet, I'm headed down that road. It's been a whirlwind of emotion trying to keep my hobby a passion while still trying to make a living with it as well!  I have found myself a little uninspired the past few weeks and I've been putting off sharing anything here simply because I just wasn't to happy with it. On the other side of things, I've managed to direct my inspiration to my portraits and got some great shots this past week! So, as I try to figure out this balancing act, I've decided to take a little of the pressure away...I'm not going away completely, but I am going to spend a little less time out here in blog world, specifically in groups and challenges....I still plan on sharing my favorite shots of the month and my 365 for the month, so I'll at least post twice a month! I love seeing all your work and hearing your comments about mine, so I'll still be around, just not as much! Hopefully by the beginning of the new year I'll be closer to being balanced and ready for some more challenges, plus I'll be participating in Faith's Simplicity DLSR class in January, maybe I'll see some of you there!

The begining of it all...

I bought my DSLR at the beginning of this year...in March to be exact. I remember my nights scouring the Internet for tips, reviews and prices to find just the right camera. How much did I want to spend, how big did I want it to be, Canon vs. Nikon…you get the idea. Finally, I decided...I picked the Nikon D5000, excitedly ordered and waited for its arrival! When the knock on the door finally came, my heart sang with excitement! I tore the tape of the box quickly found the charger and battery and started getting some juice to those batteries! Meanwhile I admired my new baby and waited in anticipation for the light on the charger to quit blinking. I did chores to keep busy, sneaking glances at the flashing light as I passed through the kitchen with loads of laundry. Then it stopped, the light stayed constant! It was time! Click, click, click! Before I knew it I was on my way to filling up my 1GB memory card and knew a larger one would end up on my shopping list in the very near future! My first shots were of my boys, my youngest trapped in his high chair and my oldest running away from the strange contraption I was pointing at him! Over the last several months I have grown tremendously! I've participated in challenges, entered competitions, made some cash off my hobby and started a photographic journey to 365 days of photos! Today, eh, tonight, this morning, I don't know its super late, early??  I wanted to share my first shots from my camera in addition to my favorite 365 photos from the month of September! It’s been a crazy journey, but I’ve loved every minute of it!

The next four shots were some of my first shots ever with my new camera, I have always dappled in photography and have had a passion for it, but it had been on the back burner for quite awhile. So when I picked up the camera and got these shots of my boys, the fire was lit once again! Since those first awkward days of finding my new place and warming up to the title "photographer", my passion has only grown and I become more and more comfortable in this new skin!

{I'm using this shot for the Paper Mama Challenge, Confusion}

Now on to my 365 day photographic journey! September has been quite a month, surgeries, photo shoots, recovering from surgery...this month has been crazy to say the least! I wasn't on my "A" game much this month, I've been focusing my craft elsewhere and this months crop of photos haven't been my favorite. However, I managed to get a few shots I like!

I've already shared in previous posts most of my 365 photos here and here...So, here is the rest of the month...I think I'm missing two pictures, as far as posting goes, but hopefully I'll be able to get them all posted to my Flickr 365 Gallery soon. The button to my 365 gallery on Flickr in is my sidebar.

As you can see lots of low light situation, result of near forgotten photos! I didn't take alot of time to set up or "stage" any photos. Oh well, we learn from our bad days, right? Have a great day!

Brooke

Blog for Your Breast Day-Write Pink

A few weeks ago Hyacynth over at Undercover Mother emailed me and asked if I would be interested in designing a button for a breast cancer awareness campaign she and the other founders of Bigger Picture Blogs were putting together. Of course I accepted and got busy making examples to share with her, after all it's for a  great cause!

Fortunately, my family has never been faced with breast cancer directly, however, I have had co-workers, church members and friends who have. You might be like me and never been directly affected by breast cancer, but it doesn't mean we don't need to stay informed about it. I am a woman after all and I only benefit from knowing about my own body and the things that could effect it. So educate yourself, learn about breast cancer prevention and keep yourself healthy! That is one of the goals of "The Army of Women", stop it before it starts. If  you want to know more about breast cancer, blog about your own story, or read others stories head on over to bigger picture blogs and the founders blogs and start reading!  You can also head on over the "The Army of Women" site and read about their cause...

During the month of October, the Bigger Picture Blogs community is writing stories. Stories of survival and of loss. Stories of education, support, and prevention. Stories for mothers and daughters, sisters and wives, friends and grandmothers, aunts and nieces. We're writing Pink for every person who has known breast cancer too well. And we're writing pink in hopes that no one will ever have to write pink for you.

Please join Bigger Picture Blogs today as we kick off Write Pink! from the Head, Heart and Feet by teaming up with Army of Women and bloggers everywhere to Blog for our Breasts. 

The Love/Avon Army of Women offers women the opportunity to partner with the scientists who are conducting research that will end this disease--once and for all. Our revolutionary initiative has two key goals:

1.to recruit one million healthy women of every age and ethnicity, including breast cancer survivors and women at high-risk for the disease, to partner with breast cancer researchers and directly participate in the research that will eradicate breast cancer once and for all.

2.To challenge the scientific community to expand its current focus to include breast cancer prevention research conducted on healthy women