We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Kelly Conley. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Kelly below.

Hi Kelly , thanks for joining us today. Parents can play a significant role in affecting how our lives and careers turn out – and so we think it’s important to look back and have conversations about what our parents did that affected us positive (or negatively) so that we can learn from the billions of experiences in each generation. What’s something you feel your parents did right that impacted you positively.

Gosh, there are so many wonderful things about my parents. They have had a huge impact on my life and my career and paved the way for me to be the mother and wife that I am today. They showed us stability, love, safety and taught us responsibility. We were brought up to respect those around us, to have compassion and to show kindness. My dad worked 3 jobs but we always grew up having family dinners even if it was on the ball field since my brother played competitive baseball for about 15 years. We just always knew our parents were there for us even in the chaos of life. I think one of the biggest things they taught us was work ethic and to take care of the things we had. We never had a lot of money growing up but we never did without. We might not have had named brands or took the vacations our friends did but we truly did appreciate the things we did have. For instance, we never thew our bikes on the ground. We knew how hard they had worked to buy them and we had better take care of them! They have been huge supporters of my career always telling me how far I’ve come. In times when I’ve wanted to quit, my mom has been the loudest voice telling me not to. I’ve been so blessed with a wonderful support system.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am Kelly Conley Photography. I am a wife, mother, sister and most importantly a believer in Jesus Christ. I am a portrait family, child, lifestyle photographer. I stepped into this career really by accident. I’ve always loved photography and had a basic camera that I used to photograph my girls. I decided to take a class teaching me to use manual instead of auto and the rest is history. My biggest regret is that I didn’t learn earlier not for my business but for my girls. I wish I had been able to document their childhood differently.
I think my “job” as a photographer happened at the exact time it was supposed to. My girls were older and I had a little more time. It was nice to have something for myself at that point in my life.
I feel like and have been told my clients that I have a way with littles and extend a ton of patience during my sessions. I try really hard when things aren’t going smoothly to reassure parents that it’s okay! I almost always get exactly what I need.
In an industry that changes constantly, I’ve just tried to stay myself.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

I was taking on a lot of sessions and was almost at the point of burning out when my daughter became pregnant during her junior year in college. I knew at that moment that she had to be the priority. What was most important is that she felt supported, loved and could finish college so when my precious granddaughter was born, I cut way back on sessions so that I could keep her. Hannah was able to graduate with honors and took a teaching job. I haven’t and don’t think I ever will go back to doing as many as I used to and that’ okay. I feel like I have a great balance of being able to help with grandkids all while taking on enough sessions to give me that creative outlet.

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

I would post pictures of my girls on social media and I began to have people asking me to take theirs which was shocking to me. I started out just photographing friends and family for fun and for the extra practice. I then felt like I had enough confidence to begin charging. I did my research and got all of the licensing that I needed, built a little website and started taking on clients. It was A LOT in the beginning because I still had to much to learn but as I grew so did my business. It has truly been such a beautiful blessing.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.kellyconleyphotography.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kellybconleyphotography