Our New Dining Room Table + My Moody Traditional Dining Room Mood Board

Today I’m sharing our gorgeous new dining room table from Wayfair, along with my current plans for the dining room in our new home!

One of the biggest sticking points with me when we were looking for homes was that I needed a formal dining room. Honestly, of all the things on our wish list, it was probably the hardest to find! I wasn’t okay with just a large eat-in kitchen area – I needed both that and a formal dining room with actual walls.

I love a dining room. We haven’t had a true dining room since our first house, and it’s something I have missed so much. I love gathering as a family in a more formal space for a regular Tuesday night dinner. I love getting things all fancied up for guests when we have them. And, I love spending time in the dining room to play games, do puzzles, craft, and more. It’s just a space that was really important to me. And I’m so glad I held my ground because it feels so good to have one again!

Of course, not everything can be perfect. One concession I ended up making is that our dining room is a bit smaller than the space we had in our previous house. The dining room table we’ve had since we bought our first house is giant. Like, giant giant. It comfortably seats 10 people! And, while it technically can fit in our dining room, it doesn’t really functionally work there. Thankfully, it fits like a glove out on our covered patio, so that’s where we’ve got it living now.

But, that left us without a dining room table! For the first couple months that we lived here, we just used our old patio table. It was too small for the space and not at all the right style, but it worked great as a temporary measure. But, as we head into the holidays it became really important to me to get this space feeling a little more settled. I really wanted our first Christmas brunch in this house to be around a dining room table that can actually fit all of us!

Choosing Our New Dining Room Table

I spent weeks looking for the perfect table. My parameters were:

• I wanted something with a traditional feel. Not too modern. Not too farmhouse. But also, not too formal or fancy-feeling!
• It needed to have a leaf. We rarely need to sit more than 6 people in our dining room, so I didn’t need the table to be an 8-seater year-round. But, it was really important to have the option.
• I wanted something that wasn’t too wide. I love a really expansive table, but our dining room is on the small side. I didn’t want things feeling cramped.
• I wasn’t picky about the exact color, but it needed to be wood-toned.
• The table needed to be on the affordable side. I just can’t bring myself to drop $2k on a piece of furniture right now!

In the end, I landed on the Bauer Extendable Dining Room Table from Sand & Stable at Wayfair. I grabbed it during their Way Days sale, so it was under $1,000. After looking at dozens and dozens of tables over the course of the last few months, I just kept coming back to this one. I absolutely love the chunky turned legs. It reminds me of a Restoration Hardware table I dreamed about for years.

This table is really beautiful. It’s slightly distressed, which makes it feel a little more casual. I love that the shape feels really traditional but the color makes it a tad more modern. It’s exactly the balance I was looking for!

Future Dining Room Plans

Of course, if you give a girl a new dining room table, she’s going to start dreaming about the rest of the space. And, oh boy, have I been dreaming. My goal for this space is for it to feel like a little jewel box of a room when you walk in the front door. It’s tucked off to the side but it’s one of the first things you see. So, I want it to be cozy and welcoming, but make a statement.

I’m not ready to fully commit to anything just yet (I see myself tackling this space in January-ish!), but today I’m going to open up my brain a little and show you what I’m thinking as of today.

Are you getting the vibes? I want it to feel elegant and a bit formal, but still like you can actually come in and get cozy. I’m not married to it as a wall color, but I’m really loving this modern-feeling taupe-y brown. But, I reserve the right to change my mind and do a deep green. Or even a super dark burgundy! We’ll see.

I’ve never done a dining room rug, but these floors are making me feel like I have to (cover those babies up!), so we’re gonna give it a shot. There’s a small piece of me that wonders if we should ditch the tall bar cabinet for something like a sideboard or buffet, but I love it too much to let it go!

Moody Traditional Dining Room Mood Board Sources

• Paint Color: Dirty Chai by Clare Paint
• Ceiling Medallion
• Landscape Art
• Art Light
• Wall Molding (I’ll probably do my own, though!)
• Chandelier
• Spode Plate (representative of the plate wall art I want to do!)
• Cream Linen Curtains
• Dining Room Table
• Henredon Bar Cabinet (vintage, read more about it here)
• Faux Stems
• Dining Room Chairs
• Rug

I’m sure this will shift and change as we get closer to actually making some progress in here, but so far I’m feeling really good about this direction!