Q&A Thursday: Dining Table

Today's Question comes from Sarah:
Where did you get your dining room table? I have been on a quest for a few years for a table that is real wood, light colored (I'm woefully out of fashion right now apparently), can seat 6 daily and easily expand to seat 10, have pedestals and rounded edges (I imagine I can seat even more than if the corners were squared and had legs) be able to take the lumps and bumps of kids and is affordable. Yours seems to fit that bill.
We bought our table at a store called Oak Plus about ten years ago. It has since gone out of business in our area. Our table has two leaves, the great pedestals, and we can seat up to ten people when necessary. Eight fits quite comfortably, but since we have nine seated at the table (Katie's in a high chair nearby) now, it's getting a bit cramped. And Sarah, I feel your pain in your quest, because we are on a similar quest to find a new table ourselves. We love the brightness of our maple kitchen (when we were building, alder was the fashion), and were glad our table matched that. Since then, though, the trend seems to be going towards dark, dark, dark and it has been tough for us to find what we're looking for. Our plan is to fill the space with two square tables with pedastals. Pushed together, the two tables will seat twelve, and then when we have company, we can pull the two tables apart and seat four more by having two tables instead of one. While there are tons of dark tables, we have not been able to find anything in maple anywhere on the internet or in local furniture shops. Luckily, my husband is fairly handy and we were able to find two pedestals on Ebay rather inexpensively. Since I just want a basic, unadorned square top, he's planning on making it. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping by Christmas we'll have a new table. Good luck in your quest!

Comments

Unknown said…
I'm crossing my fingers for you :)
Good luck finding a table. I just had to comment and tell you how much I enjoy benches instead of chairs at our large table. We had chairs like yours and I was constantly cleaning the rungs on the back. We had two benches made a few years ago and I absolutely love them. We can even fit more people around the table with the benches. Just a thought you might want to consider.
Montana Blakes said…
We have that same table and love it. But I wish I'd gone with darker. However, our kitchen cabinets are hickory with some dark streaks so my husband is going to make a lip (edge, molding--not sure what to call it) at the top and that will be dark brown to match the door pulls I picked out that are dark brown. As for the table itself, we are VERY cramped around it now (nine kids) and have resigned ourselves to expanding to the barstools at the nearby counter if need be. We don't have room to add another table (or even leaf). But our oldest in a junior so unless I suddenly pop our quadruplets or something we should be fine! ;)
Kazzy said…
The dining room table is the most important furniture in the house, in my opinion. Lots of talking, eating, crying, visiting, etc.

Sorry, but I am a dark wood fan and can't help ya with any suggestions for light wood stuff. Cool that your hubby will make a table for you!
John said…
We have that table. It is darker, but we got it 4 years ago at Ashley furniture. I suspect you could request light wood or finish. I am pretty sure ours is just a naturally darker wood.
Amanda D said…
Like a couple of others, we have that table! We got it as a hand-me-down twelve years ago. It's a great table. Scarred and nicked from life and kids and memories.