dining in the dining room?

For as long as we've lived in our house, the dining room hasn't been a dining room, for many reasons. First, we don't have a dining room suite and separate "breakfast nook" dining set. Second, we don't need a dining room. And lastly, I really wanted to use the dining room (which I took to calling the "conservatory" in a snooty British accent) as the room to hold my baby grand piano. But, I don't own a baby grand piano. So, it stayed relatively empty, except for a bookcase, a keyboard piano, occasionally a Christmas tree, and a chair from Memaw, not to mention over-flow of Britton's toys.

I was inspired by Jessica's house makeover, and ready to finally finish our house. And one more thing pushed it to the forefront. One night as we were eating dinner, Britton wanted to sit next to the hub and me. That meant we had to put her at the end of the table. And because our dining table is somewhat large for a breakfast nook, it was a tight fit. I said to Britton, "You know what kind a table you can sit at and sit next to everyone? A round table." And it stuck.

Here is the breakfast nook "before":



I love this table. It belonged to my father's parents, and is made of teak. The chairs are from Target, because the original chairs were in such bad shape and needed to be replaced.

And the "after"! Sorry it is so dark. The set is by Better Homes and Gardens from Wal-Mart, and by far the best deal I could find for a table and four chairs.




A better picture (from the website) of the table...



And our dining room now, since I couldn't find a "before" picture. Yes, the sewing machine moved to the dining room! And that baby quilt hanging over one of the chairs - I'll show ya'll that soon. And no, I'm not pregnant and it's not for me.





We also switched the bookcase in the dining room with the one in the guest room, since the one in the guest room kind of resembled a hutch (with the cabinets on the bottom) and matched the wood tones of the dining room table. Now the dining room is begging for some art on the wall, and I think I already have the perfect picture to hang. But by the time the hub got the bookcases switched and I moved all the books to the guest room, we were done!