Deck the Halls- Dining Room

Ohh how I love decorating for Christmas. Here's what I did this Christmas in our dining room. Ohh how I love it.

It is just so easy with Red and Greenery and Sparkle all over!

 MMM take in the Bling Bling.

 I got my red ornaments last year at Target's after clearance sale for 90% off!!

That's like basically free. I stocked up but now I wish I would have gotten more. :)

 My Joy and Believe were after Christmas buys at TJ Maxx. 

This Believe banner could so easily be recreated by all you crafters out there.

Now who wants to join me for Christmas dinner?

Stay tuned for my Family Room, Kitchen, and Porch Christmas decor.

Coming Soon!

See my dining room/ dresser transformation here. (My top post of all time.)

Linking up to:
http://www.betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/ 
 http://thediyshowoff.blogspot.com/
http://thriftydecorchick.com/  

A post worth waiting for!!

Ok sorry everyone. I lost my camera battery charger so I haven't been able to post in a while but I found it and an able to post again. YAY!
I have been keeping busy with projects. Here is the rundown of what I've been doing for the past few weeks. Hope it was worth the wait!!

• I refinished my long dresser-now buffet. Painted bottom black, refinished/re stained the top, and raised it 3 inches.
• Painted big mirror over buffet.
• Accessorized dining room.

• Painted office a blue gray.
• In the process of painting futon (ran out of paint)
  
• Rearranged office furniture.

• Started nursery bedding. Found a Pottery Barn set on Ebay, and I an going to embellish it with more ribbon and make the quilt.- Oh and I got a new sewing machine!! Double yay!
  
• Bought, painted, and glazed end table for nursery. Soo gorgeous!!
  

• In the process of putting beadboard in our family room bookshelves.
  

Phew. So I am going to take this in strides and show you my new dining room/buffet today. :) You'll have lots to look forward to within the next few days.

Now on with the pictures! Before with no bench and a much too big armoire.
Also see(Craigslist table and chairs $50) and (reupholstered chairs)

Before with turquoise dresser. It so was not long enough! (Now it's a pretty changing table.)

Replacement dresser and mirror before I painted them:

Found on Craigslist for$30

Bored of the before's already?! Give me some good pictures!
Drum roll please- here are the afters!

See those legs? Funny story. I raised the buffet 3 inches by adding baseball end caps from the Louisville Slugger baseball museum. They are the leftover wood on the end of the bat after they carve the bat out. They were free and had tons of them- I knew they'd come in handy. :)
Long dresser and mirror fit much better here.
I decided to go a little more sophisticated with the black bottom and stained top.

Made the bench from scratch.
I love to decorate this during holidays.

Anyone up for a pinecone cocktail?
Found this silver tray at Goodwill for $2. Whoot whoot!
Oh and one more thing we use this dining room as my girls coloring/ craft room. The dresser has plenty of drawers and everything was so inexpensive anyways. They hop up on the bench and color away. I LOVE that it is getting used so often.
Oh did I mention that this ENTIRE dining room only cost around $200! Oh yeah.
Stay tuned for a bunch more exciting projects!!
Will it be the office, nursery or beadboard book shelves?

Linking to some of these parties

Monday

http://thepersimmonperch.blogspot.com/

http://www.thegirlcreative.blogspot.com/

http://www.betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/

http://asoftplace.net/

http://cottageinstincts.blogspot.com/

http://www.twiceremembered.blogspot.com/

Tuesday

http://todayscreativeblog.blogspot.com/

http://itssoverycheri.com/

http://www.sillylittlesparrow.com/

http://www.tipjunkie.com/

Wednesday

http://www.thethriftyhome.com/

Thursday

http://www.betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/

http://www.somewhatsimple.com/

http://www.theshabbychiccottage.net/

Friday

www.Design-aholic.blogspot.com

http://www.remodelaholic.com/

http://www.decormamma.blogspot.com/

http://www.missmustardseed.blogspot.com/

http://www.poppiesatplay.blogspot.com/

http://romantichome.blogspot.com/

Saturday

http://funkyjunkinteriors.blogspot.com/

Sunday

http://shanty2chic.blogspot.com/

http://thediyshowoff.blogspot.com/

Dining Bench Completed!

Here is how I finished it!



It matches quite beautifully.

Here it is before the paint and stain. See this Post
And here's a sneak peek at what we are working on now. Any guesses?

To see the beginning of this project go here. The plans were based on Ana's at Knock Off Wood.

Big Reveal!!

Can you guess what we built today?


It's our new dining room bench! We got the plans from Ana at Knock Off Wood. Except her plans were for a 54 in bench so we modified it and made a 6 footer.
Now I just have to figure out how I want to finish it! I would love suggestions.



This is what my dining room looks like (well a few months ago actually). Now I need to tie in my rustic country bench and shabby chic dresser. Did I mention I found this table and chairs for $50 on Craigslist! See this post on my dining room.

And instead of the armoire I now have this blue buffet/dresser- see here. I am actually going to redo this look on another longer dresser I found recently. Ahh shoot me.

But I think it will be good, because this time I think I will leave the top brown to tie into the table better and darken up the blue a bit.
I love all the colors in this fabric.

No I am not afraid of color- but don't want to over do it.
Should the top of the bench be stained dark brown with the bottom painted blue/turquoise to match the dresser?
Should it all be stained to match the table?
Should I paint the chairs and bench a distressed black? Maybe with a little blue peeking though?
Should I refinish all my pieces?

Oh the possibilities! What would you do?