The list is real, and it moves faster than the number on it suggests.

Joining costs nothing — And holds nothing. It is a note of interest, not a booking, and stepping off is a one-line message
It moves faster than it looks — A third of any list steps off before their turn. That is expected and nobody is chased about it
Your turn is a conversation — Not an invoice. When it comes round you get a call, and saying "not now, keep me on" is a normal answer
Then a deposit — A third, and that is the point where it becomes real. Until then nothing is owed by anybody
Roughly how long — Usually four to six months. Replace that with your own figure, and describe it as a pattern rather than a live count
Jumping the list — Isn't possible and isn't sold. If it were, the list would mean nothing and the people on it would know

A date turns it into a delivery — And paintings do not respond well to that. The work that gets rushed is the work nobody ends up loving
Things go wrong — Illness, a warped panel, a colour that will not sit down. All three happen and none of them cares about your date
What to do instead — Commission it whenever, and on the day give a card with a photograph of the underpainting in it
That is a better present — Genuinely. It shows the thing being made for them, which is more interesting than a finished object arriving in a box
If it truly must be a date — Say so before the deposit. Sometimes it is possible, it costs more, and you will be told plainly which one it is
The honest version — A rushed commission is the only kind that ends in a refund. It has happened twice and both had a date on them

More than one decision-maker — The commonest cause by a distance. Two people who half-agree produce a painting neither of them wanted
The fix — One person decides and says so at the start. The other is welcome to everything except the final word
A brief that is really a memory — "The light on that afternoon" is not a picture, it is a feeling — and it can't be checked against anything
The fix — Find one photograph, however bad, and one sentence about what mattered in it. That is enough to work from
Reference photos nobody owns — A picture off the internet belongs to whoever took it, and I can't work from it however small it seems
The fix — Your own photographs, or somebody's you can actually ask. A phone snap in poor light is more use than a stranger's good one

Yes, tell me the room — A photograph of the wall in daylight and another in the evening. Those two pictures answer more questions than a paragraph does
Light matters more than colour — A north-facing wall changes a painting far more than a cushion does. It is the first thing worth knowing
Size is the real risk — Almost everybody goes too small. Cut a newspaper to the size you think and tape it up for a week before deciding
What I won't do — Design it around a colour scheme you might change. It will outlast the sofa and it should be allowed to
A useful middle — Tell me the two colours you don't want in it. That is far more workable than a palette to match
If it doesn't suit the room — You'll be told before it is painted rather than after. That conversation is free and it happens more than you'd think