How Shea and Syd McGee Find Time for Themselves With Three Kids: ‘It’s Always a Dance’
“It’s not about an even split of time every single day,” the parents of three tell PEOPLE as they celebrate the third season of their hit Netflix series Dream Home Makeover
Shea and Syd McGee are two of the busiest names in interior design — and are still figuring how to juggle every aspect of their packed lives.
The couple star in the third season of their hit Netflix series Dream Home Makeover, which launched July 27 on the streaming platform, while also balancing their three children and their ever-expanding design firm Studio McGee.
But as Shea, 37, tells PEOPLE, “It’s always a dance” making time for themselves amid their growing family and bustling business. “I think we realized that, for us, it’s not about an even split of time every single day,” she admits. “There are times when filming is a long day and then, come weekend, we are going to go somewhere really fun with the kids and we are putting those phones down and we are focusing on that.”
“Or it’s time for us to go to dinner, the kids are with the babysitter — we just have to choose that time wisely,” she adds. “But it can’t all just be an even split every single day, and that has worked for us.”
The Utah-based pair are parents to daughters Wren, 9, Ivy, 6, and Margot, 12 months. Shea notes that “family is so important to us” and they were ready to take on the responsibility of a third child while filming the most recent episodes of Dream Home Makeover.
“On one hand it’s busier, but this wasn’t our first rodeo,” Shea says. “We were not in that ‘first parent mode’ where we were stressed about everything, and so that was nice to have that. Like, ‘I think we can do this. I think we know how to do this.'”
Syd, 37, interjects, “It definitely felt like we could do it after she stopped waking up like three or four times a night.” As the pair point out, having a five-year age gap between their younger daughters helped the situation. “We can say, ‘Hey, go play in the backyard,’ and it helps a lot to just have them be a little bit more independent,” says Shea.
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As Wren and Ivy adjust to spending more of their lives on camera, the McGees say they’ve grown far less “camera shy” and were “stoked” to get their own microphone packs while filming the latest season. The sisters also couldn’t be more in “love” with their new sibling, regularly fighting to take turns as babysitter.
“They love her so much… Everyone wants to do everything for the baby, which is really great and helpful,” Shea gushes. “It really has made a big difference. You can say, ‘Hey Wren, go get a diaper, help me do this.’ And they love to help, so it has been different this time around.”
But their helpfulness can sometimes lead to overzealousness. As Syd points out, “Everyone wants to pick up the baby, everyone wants to carry her around. Sometimes Ivy will be like, ‘I’m watching the baby,’ and we’re like, ‘Awesome.’ And then she’ll just leave and we’re like, ‘Okay, we cannot rely on that.'”
The kids have even become more interested in design and are taking an active role in their personal spaces. “When it’s time to make the bed, they take it very seriously, which I am very proud about,” says Shea. “They style their pillows and they make sure their blankets are just right. I’m like, ‘Yes, they’re learning something!'” Syd admits he is now “fourth out of fifth” in the house when it comes to the “making the bed category,” slotting just ahead of baby Margot until she can do it for herself.
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The couple shot to Instagram fame in 2010 when Shea, an interior designer by trade, began sharing some of the home renovations she was undertaking on the platform and followers fell in love with her signature light-and-rustic interior style. Syd joined to handle the business side.
Together the pair turned Shea’s passion into a design empire and Studio McGee was born. They launched the Netflix series in 2020 and “still kind of can’t believe” their immense success. “I think we’re still kind of shocked that we had a season one and so to be at season three… it’s amazing,” exclaims Shea.
“Sometimes we joke, like, ‘Do people really know who we are? Do they watch our show? I don’t know,'” Syd says with a laugh. “Then we’ll be at the grocery store and someone will be putting things in their cart and just staring… It’s really fun to meet people and just be like, ‘Hey, we watch your show and this happened,’ or ‘We did this at our house because of you guys.'”
“We love hearing when people come up to us and they’re like, ‘We watched this episode and we saw that you did this, and so we did this in our homes.’ That is the best compliment to me,” Shea adds.
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