Comments on: What’s your dining room dilemma?

By: christina

christina — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 13:22:46 +0000

my dining room is very small, i have a table and 4 chairs, a wooden hutch with my husbands collection of cologne bottle cars on it and shoved beside it are a lot of plastic bins on wheels and smaller bins plum full of craft items. i want my dining room back! I want it to look clean and organized and more adult looking. help me please!!

By: Come Shoot The Breeze With Me |

Come Shoot The Breeze With Me | — Wed, 06 May 2009 06:53:23 +0000

[...] Read the Monthly Organizing Round-Up final post for kitchens here. Dining rooms are next up, and if you have any puzzling dining room dilemmas, Laura is taking questions here. [...]

By: Come Shoot The Breeze With Me | A Classic Housewife In A Modern World

Come Shoot The Breeze With Me | A Classic Housewife In A Modern World — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 04:19:39 +0000

[...] Read the Monthly Organizing Round-Up final post for kitchens here. Dining rooms are next up, and if you have any puzzling dining room dilemmas, Laura is taking questions here. [...]

By: Jennifer B

Jennifer B — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 16:24:41 +0000

I just got my April issue of Martha Stewart Living and it has 4 different hidden office ideas in it. The article starts on page 153 and includes a dining room/office space. One of their ideas includes using window seats as filing cabinets.

My personal fav is the craft cabinet. They took two bookcases and joined them on one side with a piano hinge. Then they set one on casters, making it a door of sorts. Plexiglas is used to keep things on the shelf(door) as it opens and closes. They will have a how-to for it on http://www.marthastewart.com/bookcase-office (according to the mag) but it doesn’t seem to be up yet.

By: wesleyjeanne

wesleyjeanne — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 15:16:02 +0000

We don’t really have a dining room per se because we just have one big kitchen-dining-living area. Our dining room table is in a space that logically makes up a dining area, next to the kitchen island.
My issues are:
1) I hate my chairs, bought as unfinished furniture and painted ourselves when we were first married
2) I hate the way the chairs scratch the hardwood floors (I do use the felt tips but they don’t stay and they collect dust bunnies
3) My dining room table, bought as our first married-couple furniture purchase is a beautiful cherry table that is MUCH too nice for the use it gets now being the center, pretty much, of your room. I have to keep it covered all of the time with a pad and vinyl tablecloth so the kids don’t destroy it.
4) our dining room table has to serve so many purposes–office, art center for the kids, eating area, play space, study space, bill-paying, conference area, staging srea, etc. I wish I had a good way to organize the stuff we use at that table (office stuff and art supplies, as well as china) and have the dining area look nice (non-officy and noncluttered). We do have a buffet but that has to hold the table linens and overflow from my kitchen cabinets (which are few and poorly arranged).

MY dream: to make a family room downstairs and turn my current living room space into dining room and expand the kitchen into the current dining space with a wall of storage and desk space that comes out of the wall so that my husband can sit facing each other and work at the same time. Sigh. I can picture it so perfectly in my head. Someday.

By: Bethany

Bethany — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 19:45:46 +0000

I have two toddlers who make a mess at mealtimes, and a very old antique table that I wanted to protect. I am not big on vinyl talbecloths, but it was unavoidable. I get a solid color that I can attach elastic to so that it fits like a showercap over the top of the table. Then I just replace the vinyl cloth every 6 months or so. I found that using flat-top tacks to secure the cloth under the table in several spots helps it stay tight and look nice. Now water glass rings are no worries, and it is so easy to wipe off. Best of all, my toddlers don’t try to lift or pull the tablecloth off mid-meal! Now if I could just find a way to keep the floor clean without having to mop nightly.

By: Marilyn

Marilyn — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 02:06:51 +0000

I too have the problem of the little pads under the chair legs coming off even though I have used goop which I used to glue rock on my fireplace in the backyard. Have you used the kind that you nail in and if so, how effective have they been?

By: Laura

Laura — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 01:22:25 +0000

Lily, that is a really clever idea!

By: Lily

Lily — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 01:16:50 +0000

For the lady who asked how to store place mats and linen. I hang mine from skirt hangers.. the ones with grip clips. Then I hang the hanger on a hook on the inside door of the cupboard in the dining room. Takes up no space and keeps them wrinkle free all the time.

By: Proverbs31

Proverbs31 — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 17:02:07 +0000

To:
All of the people who end up with *STUFF* on their dining table.
From:
Someone in the same boat. ;)

Our dining table has always been a hotspot for me. It’s such a convenient stacking surface. First of all, I’ve been trying to avoid things getting stacked there in the first place – by noticing when someone starts to set something on it and making them put it where it goes.

But mainly, the biggest thing I have done to help with this is to make the kids clean off the table while I am cooking dinner. And recently, I added the responsibility to clean it off, completely after we’re done eating. (That way nothing gets left and held over til the next meal.) They each have to clear their own dishes, and then my oldest has to clear the table and my younger daughter has to wipe it down. It’s been working quite well.

Also, for those who do school at the table..

Even though we have a small school space, we often prefer to do school at the table. It helps to have a designated school shelf elsewhere, and to have school supplies contained in storage containers with lids that can be brought to the table, packed away and returned to the shelf. Each of my daughters has a container with their own scissors, crayons, rulers, writing paper, etc – everything that will fit inside except for textbooks.