Happy New Year, Friends! 🥳 I kind of love that we get to say we’re in the ‘20s now. Referring to the 2000s or the… ‘teens’ 🤔 didn’t do it for me. If you’re anything like me, you love to make a plan, set goals, dream a little bit at the beginning of a year. Resolutions aren’t really my thing, but I love the blank pages of the calendar and the possibility of a fresh start.

One of my favorite things to do is buy a pretty planner, new markers, stickers, paperclips (all of aisle 10 at Hobby Lobby) and start mapping out my year.  It makes me feel productive, which sometimes is half the battle. So if you’re setting goals, intentions, resolutions…I’ve got one more for ya this morning. 

Do you have a DSLR (digital) camera that’s sitting around collecting dust? Or maybe Santa even brought you a shiny new one? I challenge you to learn how to use it this year. I know..it looks complicated. There are lots of buttons, dials, numbers…even fractions. Maybe it’s been parked in auto mode for years. 

But something happens when you pick up a real, legit camera instead of just your phone. You start to be more intentional about the photo you’re taking. It’s not just another snapshot that will live and die with thousands of others in the cloud. 

If you take a little time to figure out some of the different modes, you might be surprised at what you’re able to create with it.  I was very pregnant with my first child the first time I picked up our new DSLR camera. It was intimidating and I quickly put it back down. But over the weeks and months that made up that year, I started to play around with it more and more and set about learning how to use it. By December, I found myself reaching for it more often than my phone when I wanted to take a picture of something special: my son teetering on the verge of walking or tasting his very first food. 

I used it to tell our family’s story, one photo at a time, and it felt good to follow through with that intention. Those photos were not perfect. They were not professional quality or even totally in focus every time. But I had taken them myself and I could see that they were getting better as my son grew, as I took more time to practice. 

I hope that you’ll consider adding this one to your list this year. You might surprise yourself with how much you start to love looking through that viewfinder and framing up your family’s life. If your camera’s a bit of a puzzle to you, I put together something to help get you started understanding the pieces>>  Getting to Know Your Camera: A Starter Kit.

Grab your FREE copy and get 2020 off to a good start!

Until Next Time,

P.S.When I tell somebody about my goal, it always helps me to actually follow through with it. Click here to RAISE YOUR HAND, state your name,  and say yes to learning your camera this year!