Continuing the tour with the dining room!  

In our San Francisco apartment, Michael and I didn’t have space for a full dining table so we just had a bar-height 4 top.  Although it was the right thing for our space, we were constantly wishing that we were able to seat more people.  Furthermore, since it was bar-height, it was impossible to pull additional chairs up to the table.  I hosted a girl’s Bible study group every week (MISS YOU ALL SO MUCH!!) and it was like musical chairs – people constantly trading places depending on who was eating dinner or standing up eating in the kitchen…

Knowing that we wanted to be able to host people better in São Paulo, prior to leaving San Francisco, we sold our dining set on Craigslist and went hunting for something else.  Since we didn’t know what kind of space we would have in Brazil, it was a little challenging to know what to get, so we thought that an extendable table would be ideal.  That being said, both of us have had experiences with extendable tables that were clunky, difficult, heavy, etc. so we were kind of nervous about the idea.  However, we got lucky when we wandered into a random furniture store in Emeryville one day and described what we were looking for.  Right away, the owner of the shop took us to our table.  It has a really simple, attached, pull-out leaf that easily just pops into place.  Michael was fascinated / immediately sold so we went for it.

Pull table at both ends. Flip the extra leaf over & unfold. Push together. So easy I can do it by myself — which is saying a lot.

Obviously though, we needed chairs to go with it.  I really like upholstered dining chairs and think they are super comfortable, but we learned with our previous set that we cannot be trusted with food & light fabrics so I decided to go for charcoal gray to disguise any/all stains.  What I like about this too is that – while we normally have 6 chairs around the table – if we want to extend it to seat 8, we can always pull up the two gray side chairs that are in the living room.

Dinner party?  Visitors?  We must utilize this.

More of the dining area:

Mini wine fridge (thanks BWad!) with Michael’s mini “bar” on top. The two Tiffany’s boxes in the back are totally empty — I just can’t seem to get rid of them… Looking the picture though I realize I should at least move them elsewhere…

The first door on the left goes into our kitchen. The next door in the corner is the main entrance into the apartment.

**Coming soon: Post on my first ever DIY project — redoing the bookshelves on the right** 

Although I do think the table could really use some fresh flowers to brighten things up, it’s really not as dark as it looks in these photos since the space is all open and the walls are bright white.

So…when are you coming for dinner?!

Some credits: 
Table & Chairs: Decorium Furniture & Rugs
Buffet: Crate & Barrel
Vintage Tin Tiles: Pottery Barn
Mini Wine Fridge: Wedding gift from our dear friend, Bradley Walbridge
Crystal Decanter & Cocktail Glasses: Wedding gift from Tiffany & Co (hence the boxes…)