Help! I Have a 13-year-old and I can't get out!!!

I may be going the way of Design-Block. My 13-year-old, light-of-my-life, pride-and-joy daughter might just suck the life out of me, much like Christmas.

It's just beginning. One of my nice clients told me last week she didn't think you could use the words light of my life and pride and joy in the same sentence in reference to any teenager. She's already been there, done that and has it all behind her. Lucky woman.

I did have a thoroughly invigorating and inspired day ripping baby blue and white wallpaper with pink hearts off the walls of an otherwise nice kitchen. Then I hand-troweled a new texture on the walls. Tomorrow I'll paint them a beautiful gold color I can't remember the name of. The reason I can't remember it is because I have a 13-year-old daughter I somehow thought was not going to give me any trouble in life. What was I thinking?

I'm off my meds

I can't help it. I've been warped by the Curse of the Blue Rock. And the proof lies in this fabulous half-of-a-table I just finished last night. I love it. But I'll admit it's a little out there.

The top of it, pictured above, is so rich and wonderful you can't help but touch it. The picture just does not do it justice, so you'd better stop by for a visit and check it out for yourself. Then, I got a little funky with Activation and check out the legs:

I just love that fish-eye effect. I want to do an entire wall in this, in watery colors. Here's the whole table. I don't think I like where it's located, but it sure does liven-up that long hallway.

Come on over and do it my way...

I realize there may be a few people out there who have not come on over to my way of thinking. But that's just because I haven't yet convinced you that painted furniture rules! I don't know why and yes, there are exceptions. I do resist painting things and there are some well-represented wood tones in my very own home. But as a general rule, the most ordinary piece of drab furniture can be made lovely with a carefully crafted paint job.

I was reminded that not everyone sees furniture my way the other day when I bought some darling little 1960s twin beds for my twins. I made the mistake of announcing to the nice man selling them to me that I was going to paint them.

"Paint them?!!!? Beautiful solid maple beds? And you want to put paint on them?" he gasped. I got the impression he almost wanted to yank them back out of my hands and take them back to his protective home.

In defense of my outlandish opinions, and inspired by Cote de Texas' blogged report from Dallas market, I thought I might plead my case with you here. Here's the photo that got me all juiced up and dying to paint something:

The Guildmaster line in the In-Detail showroom. I want to move in.

Is that armoire not the most romantic, most beautiful thing you've ever seen? I can recreate that, just in case you're wondering. In her blog, Joni of Cote de Texas reveals light-colored furniture like this cream collection was hot at the most recent Dallas market last weekend.

Here's a peak at the Two's Company showroom, again courtesy of Cote de Texas:

I'm sorry, but this piece looks oh so much better in white than it would in crusty brown. Those walls remind me of my girls' bathroom. Maybe I won't repaint it after all.

To further convince the masses, and in search of inspiration from other sources of painted furniture, I found a company called Patina, makers of fine Italian painted furniture. This company only reinforces my point:

The frascati table from Patina Inc.

I have a pitiful little brown table very similar to this in my garage that I bought at the St. Andrews garage sale. It can expect to be painted cream and gold any day now.

And please tell me, why on earth would you want something like this:

When you could have this instead:

Hand-painted Veneto Bombay chest from Patina Inc.

Any one of these armoires from Patina, I would tenderly love in my own home:

Just in case you're not in love with black like I am, Patina offers this yummy, less dramatic option:

If I was to let go of the two "garage-sale chic" pieces taking up residence in my bedroom right now, I would have just the spot for the following beauty:

I know it's enormous, but my ceilings are so high it requires a mammoth piece of furniture. And for my pink-loving friends, isn't this gorgeous?

Why can't pink be the new black? I want to marry this armoire.

It Ain't Easy Bein' Me But ....

Just one day after the television preacher explained to me exactly why my painted passion is so fulfilling, rewarding and apparently bears good fruit, I experience a day during which I was overcome with gut-wrenching doubt. I had work to do, it was cold and rainy, and Daughter Number 1 was having a nightmarish slumber party in celebration of her 13th birthday. I had a little bit much on my plate -- practically a Thanksgiving dinner on my plate. Here's a picture the 12- and 13-year-old darlings took last night when the night was young:

Now that the party is over and all my angst has subsided, I wonder what was I so worried about? The job got finished. It was beautiful. I got paid. Everybody is happy. The party was a success and oh, so revealing. I learned things about my daughter's friends that will serve me so very well as they age and move in to high school. Little did they know I was conducting psychological evaluations as they giggled and screamed the night away.

After the freak-out, I can't help but wonder, where the heck do these doubt attacks come from anyway? Is there a gene that only women get? I have yet to see my husband doubt or second-guess anything, (other than commitment before we were married). On second thought, maybe it's us girls that are normal and it's the men that are missing something important.

I never got around to telling anybody that on the day that Creflo Dollar explained my God-given passion, Joyce Meyer shared with me some really good advice on destructive thoughts. I'm telling you, Wednesday was my day for receiving important messages. When I was talking this over with Smart Jamie, she hinted I may be overthinking things. You think?

So I've analyzed my doubt attack for another day and a half and determined, shockingly, that it's the kids' fault. They know the buttons to push and push them with abandon. My painted groove is legit and important. So is the familia. All can be done with the careful coordination only a woman can accomplish. Even though it's their fault, what could be better than this life? Just take a look at the following evidence:

My vintage, faux-leopard coat. I'm pretty sure it doesn't get any better than my faux-leopard coat. Again, I could stand a little lipstick.

But the best, most fabulous thing of all:

Moments like this. Thank You.

What's your passion?

Yesterday I was watching that preacher Creflo Dollar on TV. I was kinda slow getting moving because I had stayed up all night painting due to my procrastination. I had to get Lavenderchick's furniture ready for her debut trip to Dallas Market. Well thank God I was lounging about, making myself available to hear Creflo Dollar's message of the day. He, like so many other preachers these days, was trying to help his mega-church audience find their true calling. As I lay there, on my wonderful bed that did not cost what it is worth, he asked me: "What are you passionate about?"

And I said, "well, beautification of all things. Furniture, walls, ceilings and souls. And then there's the outdoors: plants, landscapes, even views. I want to make the world beautiful to my eyes, wherever possible." Apparently, according to what Dr. Dollar told me personally yesterday morning, this passion of mine is God-given and that's why it is so intense and so fulfilling when I'm actually doing it. When you are floundering about without knowing what you were put here on earth to do, you first need to listen to your guts, your spirit, whatever you want to call it. Your calling is in there, just dying to get out.

I am so guilty of this in my former lives. We waste a lot of time listening to outside influences that tell us we need to be "professional," make lots of money, all that. So we do what we think we're supposed to do and don't feel good doing it. Who are we living for?

So Dr. Dollar further explained that the way we know that we're doing the right thing is that when you're doing it, you feel good, you're happy to do it, and your efforts bear fruit, to use a Biblical phrase. What I thought was really cool was when he referred to Luke 13:6-9, which is a parable Jesus used. In it he actually gives this guy a timeframe we can apply to our efforts and how to know when to give up the fight when it's not right. Mira!

"A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?' " 'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.' "

So where am I going with all this? Due to my procastination issue, I had to stay up all night painting furniture for Lavenderchick's first trip to market. Her furniture had to be beautified at any cost to complement her extraordinary lavender products. Being tired as hell forced me to languish, and in my exhaustion I was finally still enough to hear the message so that I could tell all of you about it. I could go on and on, but my daughter tells me my blogs are too long. She, of the myspace generation that types in ghetto speak like dis and dat.

Here's a picture of Lavenderchick's little hutch "before." It's just starting to get it's first coat of Faux Effects Natural White Setcoat, which, by the way, is a superior base coat. It sticks to almost everything.


Here's the shelves we're transforming to hold additional product:

The shiny stuff is liquid sander. I wanted to be sure the Setcoat would stick and this finish was pretty glossy. This beautiful shelving unit is actually pressboard and the back is something akin to cardboard with graining imaged upon it. I tell you this only so you'll be impressed with the transformed product.

Tadaaaaaa! Isn't this a much better canvas to complement Lavenderchick's creations? Up close you can see the textures better (Faux Effects Faux Stone for a little texture), plus a glaze of Faux Effects Color Solvent mixed with Lusterstone in Antique Parchment (I kind of made that up), then a glaze of Color Solvent mixed with Earth Brown Faux Creme Color. Then Activator II. Thennnn, it needed a white wash so I mixed Color Solvent with white Setcoat real thin and activated that some too. It's really cool. You can see the pressboard shelf over to the right.


Here's some closeups:

Good Luck Deb and Jack at market.

A fresh look at stencils

Just before I set out for faux college, I clicked on over to the Royal Design Studio website, looking for some idea I had seen a few months back. And what to my wondering eyes did appear but a completely revamped website with an entire department devoted to "inspiration." Stencils have come a long way baby, from the days of country kitchens.

The pink, white and black one above really got me to thinking about my girls' bathroom. It could use a little jazzing up, and this stencil combination certainly would do it. Then there's the circles and rings stencil combination we're considering for one of the Sunday School rooms at church. We're trying to de-institutionalize it by removing the pale yellow paint and spice it up with bluish gray & chocolate.

Our plan is to throw a hip shag rug in the middle of the floor, slipcover some benchy chairs and put in a Playstation for those moments when we're not screaming about Jesus. (just kidding).

I've never met her, but Melanie Royals' stencils and the way they're combined with faux finishes can be really cool. Now the industry is moving into Modellos, which are like stencils but they are one-time use adhesive-backed designs. One application to a ceiling, for example and then you can work away, coming in with colors, textures, more glazes, without having to move the stencil around, cleaning and taping and lining up and taping some more.

Here's one more stencil combination I like from the revamped Royal Design Studio website:

I can see some of thes floating around my daughter's rooms. Or, I may like this one better:

Just remember stencils always look better in combination with some kind of softening or aging faux glazes. That way, the design is there, but it's not screaming at you.

How to Get to Faux Painting Heaven

Here's me, in faux painting heaven. I'm troweling on Faux Effects Quartzstone, learning to do a sample called Terrazo as part of a class I started referring to as faux college. I've always been a knowledge dork, never wanting to finish college, wishing I could go back someday. This week, the combination of new knowledge and new knowledge about painting made it one of my best weeks ever. I could have used a little lipstick in that photo (my grandmother and mother trained me well, but they weren't there to remind me to "put on a little lipstick.")

Back to my telling you about faux college: Located right here in San Antonio, Texas, is Vigini Studios, where people from all over the world come to be schooled in all aspects of decorative painting. For this class my super-smart instructor was none other than the very talented (and cool) Leslie Morrison Vigini. If you poke around on their website, you'll see pictures of all the unbelievable contracting work they do, and if you're into decorative painting, you can find a class to move you in the right direction. We're so fortunate that San Antonio native Leslie brought her super-talented Italian husband Nicola to San Antonio, which allows us to learn from two masters right here at home. Here's a picture I snapped Friday just before lunch. We were working on the Terrazo finish. Nicola was just back from teaching a class in Dallas.

Those of us "in the know" realize what a privilege it is to be able to learn from and know such talented artists. Trust me, some people find it hard to stumble through complete sentences in Nicola's presence. The charming Italian accent only adds to his charm.

So all this week, I fluttered around on air, learning fabulous new finishes in the Designer Wall I class like Fortuny silk damask, Texas limestone, a really super cool plaster finish I've named Fran's Fresco, and even a burly walnut faux bois. To be surrounded by other artists as crazy and driven and excitable about decorative paint finishes as me -- for a whole week -- while learning from someone who's worked all around the world. It really doesn't get better than this.

A few years ago I took a class dedicated to furniture finishes from Nicola Vigini. That class changed my life because I learned the right way to do even better finishes on everything. I also learned about the Faux Effects products, many of which you can't even buy until you take classes so you know how to use them. My crackle finishes have never been the same. I'm embarrassed to show anything I did prior, even though it was considered "pretty good" then. After that class, I moved right on up the food chain and out of the Home Depot paint department forever. I'm supposing this class will change me forever, too. Even a few pieces I'm transforming for Lavenderchick's trip to the Dallas Market are going to be so much better than they would have been last week.

I'm on fire. I can't wait to get back into my own studio to tinker around with new ideas that have come to me this week. And out on some new jobs that are looming. I promise to share photos of projects in the works.

My Most Recent Favorite Thing

Abbey from Design-Block reminded me that I need to post more pictures of my work. Since that is relatively easy and I have a few pics already downloaded, here's a picture of one of the most favorite projects I completed all year.

I really can't take the credit for it. Jeff and Nancy of Jeff and Nancy Inc. actually came to me with the concept. The design is similar that of a delicious duvet they installed in a job somewhere outside the little old town of Seguin. You know, the town with the really big pecan on the courthouse square. Bryan Duckworth, formerly Robert Earl's fiddle player, has written a darling song about it called The Big Pecan.

Getting back to the dresser, I just made myself a stencil and then hand-painted it onto the dresser. I'm thinking it may have been easier with the image projected onto the dresser, but I was in a time crunch and couldn't quite figure out how to get the pattern from the duvet to a transparency sheet. The other small problem is I don't have an overhead projector. So if you know how I could have done this better and more efficiently, do share.

Jeff and Nancy are some of my most favorite designers because they aren't afraid of color and seem to have an above-average slew of lovely clients. When I met them I was super-sick of Sherwin Williams' neutrals like Macadamia, Practical Beige & Sands of Time and they've been wowing me with colorful selects ever since. Go to their website and you can see more examples of jobs we've done together. Not all of them involved me, of course.

The vibrant green I selected is Sherwin Williams Verdant 6713. I'm sure I've mentioned it before. It's my favorite new green, besides Antiquity 6402. If you go to http://sherlink.sherwin.com/swapp/color_visualizer/ you can look these beauties up and take a look for yourself. I still haven't figured out how to insert paint chips into my blog.

So there you go. Tune in tomorrow for info. from my week at faux college.

My favorite new blog

I have a favorite new blog and everyone must go see it. Design-Block's author describes herself as a has-been celebrity designer whose blog has one reader. Well, Painted Groove Girl just became her second reader, which for all intents and purposes means she has surely arrived. As we speak, I am sending my three readers on over to check it out.

Ms. Design-Block and I share a West Texas connection. And as anyone "in the know" knows, we can't help but share some history and connections we'll save for another day. It's just one of those things. My upbringing is infused with talented and terribly interesting characters, many of whom are now part of the blog world. I hope to introduce my three readers to more of them as time goes by.

Moving beyond all that, Ms. Design-Block has created an exceptionally entertaining, and might I mention well-written, blog that I won't be missing on a daily basis. This ringing endorsement says a lot, coming from me. You know, being who I am and all.

One day I hope Ms. Design-Block emerges from her design block and reacquaints us all with her brilliance. Descending to name dropping and a bit of bragging, I must reveal that I personally own two pieces from this has-been celebrity designer. She may think she's lost her luster, but I say it's just taking a rest while she devotes her energies to equally as important, if not mind-numbing endeavors. My creative energies took a 3-year hiatus but I'm working my way back into my groove.

So for what it's worth, go check it out. http://www.design-block.blogspot.com/

Why I Can't Stop Thinking About a Bad Movie

While on sabbatical from my life, I watched the movie, Fast Food Nation. I had tried to read the book, but it was a little boring, a little dry. It was fascinating, but life called me away from it. This movie came out in November of 2006, so I realize I'm a little behind the times. Sadly, I don't get to watch a lot of movies.

This movie bothered me. And not just because it exposes the utter grossness in the way our food is prepared and presented to us. I studied Animal Science at a college in San Angelo, Texas. I've been to the packing plants and I already knew what went on. Of course I wasn't such a deep thinker back then. And, I have it on good authority that someone I won't name spit on my #2 cheeseburger at the Sonic in Alpine in 1983.

Here's my list of the top 5 reasons why this movie bothered me so bad:

1. Sex. Can anyone tell me why a movie like this, which should have been a documentary, has to include graphic sex? Why did it need a R rating? For money at the box office? It's just stupid. I would have loved to watch this movie with my almost-13-year-old daughter. Since I have no way to crop out the sex scenes, she's not going to get to see it. Let me assure you, I'm no prude. If the movie makers would have been handled the sex subtly, we could have discussed the exploitation of women, why the girl in the movie should have behaved with a ton more good sense, why an education is important so you don't end up working in a fast food joint or a meat packing plant. But it's a lesson I won't get to share because of all the sex.

2. The vast majority of the people processing our food and meat are illegal immigrants. When I was growing up we didn't even know the words illegal immigrants. We had illegal aliens and a few words I won't go into. Here's the deal. It doesn't bother me that the people who are doing all the dirty work in our country are illegal. It bothers me that our own damn American citizens are too damn lazy to do it. If you watch the movie, note that the safety training videos are in English. And nobody willing to do any work hablas ingles!!!

3. It bothers me that these poor illegal immigrants come here to make a better life for themselves and then our corrupted culture ends up corrupting them. Pretty soon we'll just be one big borderless sea of corrupted, junk-food-eating fat people. See why this wasn't a happy movie to watch?

4. People are eating this food on a daily basis. Sometimes more than once a day. These fast food corporations keep track of heavy users, our sex, age, and ethnicity whenever we order. That whiz kid at the cash register is probably keying me in as a white, chubby fast-foot eating soccer Mom, not realizing I'm really super cool, my kids don't like soccer and I rarely eat fast food.

5. Nobody who needed to read this book or watch the movie did.

I'm So Confused

Just when I was starting to think my house was bugging me, that it needed to be a little more lake-housey (since it sits lakeside), a little more beachy and cool (as in tones). The terra cotta and golds and greens were beginning to bother me. I was questioning whether I was so 2002. My thought was to go cooler. Use the green, play down the red. And for God's sakes slip-cover my chairs. Now this is a serious problem if you've ever been to my house because the whole house flows together in these gold and red and green colors so any change would be a major, catastrophic undertaking. The kind of thing that makes your husband question your sanity, and also the kind of thing that requires lots and lots of time and money.

Then I get the new Pottery Barn catalog in the mail today. What the heck? Right there on the cover is orange and green and inside, citrusy all over the place.

For the painted groove girl to be thinking contrary to what's going on in the world, and most specifically contrary to Pottery Barn? I need to get out more. I need to go shopping. Insert frantic shriek.

Just look at these lamps! I could actually use some new lamps. And the green would go perfectly with my already green and slipcovered PB sofa, come to think of it. Then, when I was beginning to feel a bit better, I came across this vignette:

OK this works perfectly. These are the tones in my flooring. Hurray! All is not lost. I just need to spend hundreds of dollars on pillows and throws!

And I am so glad I don't need to repaint.....