Hi Allison! And welcome to the Lenspiration community!
You have most certainly captured the moment here. 🙂 Catching the incredible excitement on the boys face and the action of him untying (or is it tying?) his shoe, coupled together with the mud smeared all over the place and the open door leading out into the “backyard”, makes me chuckle and think back to the good old days when I was young and adventurous and without concern for the prim and proper lifestyle of adulthood.
This is an excellent example of an emotionally impacting image. And that’s probably the most important part of any image. But if you can combine creative expression with artistic application, you will begin to bring your pictures to a professional level.
First, it would be so cool if there was a more shallow depth of field. I couldn’t determine through the metadata what camera you were using, but if you’re using an SLR, there are 4 different ways you can accomplish this effect. Those methods are outlined in the blog post How to Make the Background Blurry.
Second, if you had overexposed a bit (or more technically, exposed for the shadow-side of the boy) then it would have completely washed out the outside and brought more attention to the boy. It would give the impression of mystery, or “unknown adventure” to the outside too.
Third, it appears as though the door is in focus more than the eyes of the boy. This is common because most focus points are dead center (where the door is right now). Having an understanding of your camera’s Focus Points and knowing how to change them quickly will help you keep eyes, the most important element of a subject, in focus and tack sharp. This article from all-things-photography.com may give some good tips on using the focus points.
Hope that gives you some ideas!