A Year of Leaping in Faith

Welcome 2013! What an amazing year 2012 has been. I was sitting on my sofa last night, all cozy and warm, wrapped up in a blanket and found myself reflecting on all that has happened over the past year and I found myself so warm with gratitude.

Driving into the storm on Christmas Day 2012

This time last year, I had taken a HUGE leap of faith by leaving my steady paycheck of a job working for a design company in retail to launch Casa Stephens Interiors. I had been self employed for most of my design career until the market crashed in 2008 and found myself working for the “man” and was absolutely miserable. By the time my youngest had started kindergarten, I left the design field all together to work in customer service for Whole Foods and while I LOVED my job there and the fantastic people I had the pleasure to work with, it wasn’t feeding my creative side. So when I was offered a design job for a retail store near by, I took it. It came with a healthy steady pay check, really long hours, and a demanding owner who didn’t seem to value his employees as assets to his company, which was very disheartening. Add to that a 6 year old first grader at home who was falling further and further behind in school due to my long hours at work and a client who turned out to be a notorious bank robber (can’t make this stuff up, I swear). He had knocked over his 15th bank the morning he was supposed to meet me in store to finalize a very large order and fired a gun at responding police which led to a multi state wide chase that ended in Alabama. Needless to say, my decision was made. It was time to strike out on my own again.

Scared!

And I was scared but I also knew that wishing something to be real doesn’t happen unless you jump in with both feet and know that failure isn’t an option.

Fast forward to the beginning of 2013 and I have several design jobs kicking off, several that are wrapping up and because of this decision to work from home, I’ve also taken on homeschooling my 2nd grade son who is not only nearly caught up to where he needs to be scholastically, he is thriving in a way that I couldn’t have imagined possible…all because I let go and believed it was not only possible but necessary.

I had the wonderful pleasure of spending Christmas with my entire family: Mom, Dad, sister and brother in-law, 2 adorable nephews and all three of my babies, Sam (who lives in California), Jay (my handsome son) and Cayman, my sweet baby, my husband and myself. We drove to Houston for Christmas Eve and ate way too much food and just soaked up the rare opportunity to be together for Christmas. This was the first time we had ALL been together…ever. The last time we had the whole family together for Christmas, the nephews weren’t born yet so this was SPECIAL.

As we drove home on Christmas Day, we were met with the another rare occurrence: SNOW in Texas!

Snow in Texas

And we played

Snow in Texas

and played

Playing in the Snow

Snow in Texas

and posed

Laughing

and laughed

Merry Christmas

and just thoroughly enjoyed each other and the absolute blessings we have been showered with.

So as 2013 kicks off I am excited about the future. I am optimistic by nature but this is different. This isn’t just hoping for a good year, this is KNOWING and EXPECTING wonderful surprises and experiences because faith and hard work bring about greatness.

I’m excited to share with you my upcoming projects and I hope you’ll come along the journey with me.

Here’s to a great year ahead!!!

xo,

Renee