Adios la mesa!

We had a big family dinner the other night with friends, like we do quite often, and it happened....the dreaded thing that everyone wishes will NEVER happen to them. A chair broke during dinner. To make matters worse,  it happened to one of the guests!
Luckily said guests are like family to us, so we all just cursed the stupid chair and moved on. As the host however, I was mortified!!!! That was the last straw. I have loathed this stupid dining set for YEARS! One of the last remaining pieces we have from the stupid Macy's furniture mess. When we had kids I told Mike that I really wanted meal time to be a special time at our house, where everyone comes to gather together at least once a day & have genuine conversation, smiles, laughs & can discuss things to be grateful for at the end of each day. I want our table to be filled with friends and family at any given time. My dream has been to have a HUGE dining room table with a bench. I want to fit as many people at the table as possible.
I sold the remaining pieces of the dining set on Craigslist and someone whipped it up in less than 6 hours for their next DIY project. It couldn't have left my house faster!

So-we are back to "camping style" in our dining room once again. Lovely sight isn't it! :/

 For the new dining set, I knew what kind I wanted-a semi eclectic style, but I knew I'd have to be creative money wise too. Teacher salaries SUCK! So-I decided to make & sell the Pottery Barn style growth chart rulers for friends who wanted them.

I sold about 20 of these things overnight! They were more of a hit than I expected. Hoorrayyyyy!!!

That gave me money to put aside for some Pottery Barn chairs I have been eying on Craigslist-(they are even more beautiful with the fitted slipcovers, which is what drew me to them in the first place. We NEED slipcovers in this house. Yikes!) Of course our basement smelled like polyurethane for days after this little project of mine.....but oh well. Small price to pay.

Then came the issue of the table. My dream table is a trestle table from Restoration Hardware. I've drooled over it for years. The finish, the style, everything about it is PERFECTION! However, I will NEVER be caught dead paying those prices, even if I had the cash. Not doing it! I found a company in Seattle that custom builds farmhouse style tables and decided it was the way to go.

However, now I was back to the creative money issue again.....grrrrrr. Luckily-I was able to set up a few photography sessions and a big one for the preschool in town that I work with every fall & spring. Money problem solved! It's going to be a LOT LOT LOT of work photography wise, but having a new family table is SOOOOO worth it. I can't wait!