Our Home: Before and After Pictures Part V: Dining Room

For the past 3 years our dining room has been a work in progress. I've been constantly moving furniture around, changing my mind monthly on which setup I like best. It's almost funny when people come over and say--"you changed the way your table is turned." Well, yes, I change it constantly. I have a very patient husband who pretends to be annoyed but I think he secretly likes seeing things improve too.

Recently I finished redecorating our dining room. Here are some pictures of the evolution of the room and pics of the finished product!

First, let's go way back to 2008 when we first bought our home. This was before the major renovations started on our house.

 It had dated chair railing which we ripped off, and old green-ish carpet which we replaced with hardwood floors. We took down the poor old chandalier which was original to the home from the '60s, and replaced it with a more updated and timeless crystal chandalier. We added a thicker crown moulding and painted the room and ceiling.

This is how the room looked for the first Christmas in our house (2008). Brett bought this furniture at a model home sale before we got married. Was it nice, yes. Was it something I would have picked out, no. Just somewhere in the middle for me. It was livable like this-for awhile. Mostly though, I really needed a rug, so we got this Pottery barn rug in 2009...

This is how the room looked in 2009 for my friend Kim's baby shower. Not only did I add the rug, which ironically is named the Preston rug at Pottery Barn, but I also bought and hung those two coral prints on each side of the mirror. I couldn't afford to get all new chairs, so I bought just two upholstered parsons chairs for the end chairs to soften things up a bit. In comparing the last two pictures, it looks like I also replaced the lamps. No surprise there. I am constantly changing out lamps and swapping them with lamps in other rooms of the house. They are always a-changin'! The room stayed like this for at least a year, with the table moving back and fourth multiple times. 

The next big change was earlier this year when I bought 6 new chairs. I did a post about them here.  I found them at an antique store and at just $45 a chair, they were keepers! All they needed were a little TLC, so I recovered the cushions. Brett and I did it ourselves and it was super easy! I chose a tan and cream colored big check pattern to keep them traditional and a bit french-looking. Here is the before and after of the chairs--

Left: Before, Right: After

Then, I sold the buffet we used to have in there on Craigslist. Goodbye, you mediocre buffet with brass knobs--

 I then moved the mirrored buffet that we used to have in our formal living area into the dining room. Here is a photo from my blackberry...

This was okay, for a few months, but I really did not like the fact that the buffet was ultra-modern when my taste is leaning much more back to traditional/french/antique-y. I can thank the blog Cote de Texas for this. Thanks Joni!

So there I went. I sold the mirrored buffet on craigslist too. By now you are starting to think I am crazy, right? I mean, I just bought this less than two years ago. I used to love the mirrored stuff. But now, it just doesn't match the direction I am headed. So, it found a new home. A newlywed who paid me close to what I originally bought it for. I combined the money from the two buffets I sold on craigslist and bought for just a fraction more....

are you ready...

this beauty.

1920's italian antique walnut buffet. A major upgrade. A forever, will hopefully get passed down to my grandchildren someday piece. My first true antique. I'm in love.

I totally agree with Joni from Cote de Texas when she says that antiques make a room. She says it anchors the room and gives you something to work around with different decors-for the rest of your life! Agreed.

I kept the same two lamps but gave them a facelift with new lampshades, the medium sized linen drums from Pottery Barn.

So last it was the token item. The silk billow-y drapes. I have been wanting drapes in the dining room for the past three years, but I am so glad I waited until I really knew what I wanted. Every other room downstairs has pale blues and greens, which I love, but I really wanted to do something different as far as color goes. A statement room, so to speak. I went with a solid coral silk. l  already had those two coral prints and I wanted to work around those. I followed Cote de Texas' curtain formula to the T. Her blog has really become my bible for decorating, if you can't already tell.

Okay, well here it is. The final "after" pictures. Hope you like.

I would actually really love to get a seagrass rug in there instead, but I just can't justify getting rid of a perfectly good Pottery Barn rug yet. I am so glad to be done and simply in love with the finished room. I wanted to take my sleeping bag down there to sleep the first night it was done. We really do entertain a lot at our house, so it's a room we use frequently. We even try to eat dinner in there a few nights a week, just to make things more special. I've been making a whole lot more changes to our home recently, so stay tuned for more updates.