Parade of Homes 2015 - Custom Headboard

I've said for a while now that I have been so busy and can't do it all alone. When it came to working on things for the Parade of Homes this year I knew I wanted to partner up with a great photographer to take the pictures. I have a decent eye and I LOVE photography, but that is not my gift. I'm decent…I wanted awesome! I decided to partner up with Shine a Little and you will be seeing her watermark on a lot of pictures from now on! Not only is she a fantastic photographer, but she is a very close friend of mine and we have a blast doing things together! Please visit her site, you will not regret it!

Now on to the awesomeness that is this wonderful home I was blessed to be a part of this year! The first piece I'm going to talk about is the custom headboard I made for the oldest girl's room. Back in February I got together with the owner having the home built and we talked bedding, fabrics, and ideas. By the end of the meeting all was decided for bedding and later that day it was ordered. I've been lucky to work with this client before and she was so great at trusting me to pick the fabric for the headboard on my own. 

With all fabrics and supplies purchased, it was time to actually build this headboard frame.

It only took about an hour to get the whole thing together and back to my house from my dad's shop.

I'm only showing this picture so you can see how tight it was for me to work around this sucker in my family room.

 Every single one of those little suckers was nailed in while I watched Doctor Who episodes on Netflix with my kiddos. 

This room, I cannot gush enough! It turned out so awesome! The client loved the headboard and I was extremely proud of how well it went with everything. 

The sheen in the fabric makes me swoon!

I've been so excited to show you guys all of the projects I was able to work on for this home. You all need to head out to Oakmont while the Parade of Homes is going on and check out this house. The entire home is just stunning! 

Also, I would like to give a shout out to Two Thirty-Five Designs and this awesome arrow art she made! She's wonderful and this is just perfection in this room!

Fun and Fabulous Chairs

I have a thing for chairs. Always have…it's a sickness really. I don't particularly mind this sickness though. Specific things I look for in chairs are interesting shapes, comfort, and great legs. I'm a sucker for furniture legs!

My super sweet client has a great eye as well and brought me these awesome chairs, table, and lamp to make over for one of her daughters.

(I lost my before picture of the harp table, so this is a random image of the same style table from google images)

We looked for fun and funky fabrics that would update the style of the chairs but keep them sophisticated.

I stripped off the old upholstery, painted and distressed the frames.

Little details like this make me so happy!

 The lamp was just really rusted and flaky. I wire brushed it to get rid of all of the loose paint and then gave it a few coats of fresh paint. I then rewired it.

 As you can tell, I only completed one of the chairs with the table and lamp. I'm still learning how to schedule things and let's just say I over booked myself like crazy! A few weeks later I completed the second chair and two lumbar pillows and delivered them. Thankfully I have amazing clients that are VERY understanding!

The morning I delivered the final chair and pillows I only beat the rain by 15 minutes! Whew!!! I wanted to keep these chairs. Those of you that know me know that these chairs are in my signature colors and would look fabulous in my house. Even better though, was that my client loved them very much and was extremely pleased. That is always the goal!

Dreams and Forgiveness

I'm a big believer in lists. I love organization and making things simple and functional. Those type things make me so happy and content, so this is confession time for me:

Right now my life is anything but clean, organized, simple, and functional. Everything is kind of a mush pot and I feel like I'm living such a frenetic existence.

I'm only complaining a little bit and only because it is so hard for someone with my personality to accept that. I know that I am so unbelievably lucky to be doing what I love and that it is supporting me and the children. It's amazing really. I'm going to be extremely straight forward though, sometimes it is still so hard. You learn the hard way that sometimes people will mistreat you, you learn that the schedules you thought would work out just don't, you learn that you have to stay in constant motion to keep it all going.

Sometimes I get down on myself about things. Things like not keeping up with the blog like I "should", not posting as much on Pinterest or on my business Facebook page, or being slow to return calls and emails sometimes. I let myself feel so bad that I'm lagging behind or that things just aren't going as smoothly as I anticipated.

But then I sit back and let myself remember…I'm doing this alone. I do every bit of the work myself, I write every blog I manage post, I source fabrics, I place the orders, I sew everything, I strip all of the upholstery, I do all the new upholstery, I strip the finishes off the furniture, I do the staining, lacquering, or painting and sealing, I use the table saw, the miter saw, the sanders.

(fabric scheme laid out in my living room chair)

(completely packed garage)

On top of all of that, I am the only one that does the laundry, cooking, dishes, cleaning, lawn mowing, taking the children to school and picking them up again. Taking my daughter to dance and still somehow making time for friends occasionally and even dating.

I should really give myself more credit. 

(occasionally the children will help with the laundry)

(almost clean living room)

(the little tree I trimmed myself and am ridiculously proud of)

I'm saying this because I had a moment this past week when I couldn't walk through my house. There was a pathway between client furniture and kid mess and I really thought I was going to lose my mind. I thought, "How in the world are you ever going to make your dreams happen when this is what it takes day in and day out?"

It got me thinking that I have only ever thought about my true dreams for Peacock Door Designs. I'm a big believer in writing down goals so here it is - 

I want to own a design boutique. I want a place that will be workshop space for custom upholstery, furniture refinishing, and have a small retail space open to the public. I even know exactly where I want it and the building I want to buy.

Right now that still seems pretty far off, but I am still clinging to it. I'm still in the learning curve of my business right now, learning how to juggle it all, making mistakes and overbooking. It happens and I need to be better at forgiving myself for that. Some days my affirmation is just simply "I'm still making it work."

(the day I was in tears because I couldn't walk through my house and I had so much housework I couldn't see the end)

So if you're a small business owner and you are feeling overwhelmed, just know that others feel that way as well. If you're a single parent barely keeping your head above the water, I completely get it. If you are just someone that generally feels overwhelmed by things happening in your life, I'm there with you. Just remember to give yourself a little bit of grace.

I'm so grateful and feel blessed by all that has occurred in my life. It's not always easy, there are tears as well as laughter. There are failures as well as amazing accomplishments and successes.

A verse that helps me through things a lot is Philippians 4:13

"I can do everything through Him who gives me strength."

It's so important to keep reminding myself of this. The struggle is real, but never forget to choose happy!

"It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard everyone would do it. The hard is what makes it great."

- Tom Hanks, A League of Their Own

A Nursery Rocking Chair

About six weeks ago I did a post about a beautiful dresser I had painted for a nursery. Just after the dresser was completed I also did a nursery chair for the same sweet baby girl. Since then I have been so busy it has been difficult to get all of the pictures organized and actually find time for blogging. But, I love this part and I don't want to quit! I decided I will be doing short little blogs here and there until I can get caught up (ha ha ha).

The chair was in slight disrepair when I got it. Some sanding was needed, some wood filler, and the wood was also fairly dry. Repair work is very time consuming, but it's also incredibly rewarding.

It was snowing and quite cold at the time so I did the repair work inside my house.

Next  I had to start the upholstery. The chair didn't come with cushions so I had to make some this time. The fabrics were so cute and I loved working on this project.

The chair got a nice few coats of white to match the dresser.

Cute little nursery rocker for a sweet baby girl.

On to the next one!

The Curse of Old Plumbing

When it's been so long since you last blogged that you actually have to look at your own blog to see where you are in your line up, you might be overwhelmed.

I saw this picture on Pinterest and it completely sums up my life right now.

Not complaining at all I promise. It's a good thing, it's just a LOT!

About six weeks ago, while I was super busy with client work and had deadlines all over the place, my plumbing decided to back up. I thought it was just in the kitchen sink but that afternoon I realized that it was all over my laundry and mudroom.

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: I HATE CARPET! It's awful. Sorry if there are any carpet lovers out there. I agree that it can look pretty in some cases. It is so nasty though that I just can't get past what is in all those little fabric fibers and underneath the pad. One thing I will never understand is carpet in wet spaces like bathrooms, kitchens, and laundry rooms. This house was carpeted in ALL of those places. I've slowly been trying to get the carpet out but flooring is expensive! 

This is what the laundry/mudroom looked like when we moved in:

This is the disaster of the plumbing problem. Beware: gross pictures!!! Just be glad you couldn't smell it.

I had to rip out the section that the laundry machines were sitting on because they were the most saturated. But the floor is covered in old black mastic so I couldn't rip it all up or we wouldn't have anything good to walk on while waiting for the new flooring to arrive.

Why yes, that's a sheet of hardboard cut to fit the carpet cutout so that I could put the machines back in and actually have clean clothes for the children to wear to school. Feel free to insert your own red-neck joke. I think I came up with about 20 myself!

Finally having working laundry was an amazing feeling. Also, to have the smell gone was pretty fantastic. The new flooring was ordered and I cannot explain my joy when they called a week early and it was already in!

I cannot wait to show you guys this room! Stay tuned for the inspiration pictures and the finished product!