Dining Area Remodel

I know I've mentioned this before, but since moving in with Hank, I've been on a mission to remove as much "brown" from the house as possible. My most recent victim: the dining table.

Dining Table- Before

It was bar-height, heavy, and just didn't fit in the space. Not to mention that it was brown all over. We wanted something lower that would allow better visibility from the kitchen into the living area. We had been leaning towards a farmhouse table, and even toyed with the idea of Hank building one. Our budget did not include the $1000 (or more) tables that we liked the most, so we decided to be patient.

Hank has been so good about perusing Craigslist and our neighborhood Facebook "garage sale" page, and his persistence paid off two weeks ago. He found the most gorgeous antique table for one heck of a deal- $250!! (After selling our old table, we ended up only paying $100.) It's a drop-leaf, scalloped edge table circa 1950's (we think), and it's just beautiful. I can't believe we own such a unique piece of furniture.

Our pretty new dining table

After removing the old table and getting the new one in place, I immediately got to work creating a Pinterest board for our new dining area. We needed chairs, a rug, and new lighting. I could see the dollar signs adding up, and knew it would take awhile for this transformation to happen. We only buy things when we have money in the bank, so there was no way I was going to rack up credit card debt just to make it happen.

I had last Friday off and made a quick stop at HomeGoods just to see what they had in stock, and I hit the jackpot. I found two beautiful upholstered chairs for $129 each (usually $300 or more in catalogs like Ballard), and the most perfect 8x10 rug I've ever seen. ON CLEARANCE. Most of the rugs I have looked at were $600 and up, and I was staring to think we would never be able to get one. And then I found this rug on sale for $249. It was meant to be.

We still need 4 more chairs, and we've picked out a lighting fixture that we both really like, but we'll have to wait another month before we make those happen. So for now, we dine like King and Queen sitting at the head of our new (to us) table. We love the softer, lighter look of our new dining area, and I can't wait to get it all finished. Room by room we're slowly making progress.

Dining Table- After