Furniture!!

When Ryan and I were married, we were lucky enough to inherit and be gifted a lot of great furniture. The only thing we had to buy was a dining table. As poor newlyweds, we found ourselves at Ikea purchasing the cheapest table they had. It's made out of particle board or something really light and then there is a faux wood laminate on the top. The legs are aluminum and they just screw on. I think the whole thing cost us about $50. The chairs that go with it were a whopping $19 each and are probably made from balsa wood...seriously, they weigh like 1 pound. They are basic black chairs, but I upholstered them (a trick I learned from trading spaces) with some nice suede so they look MUCH nicer than they are.

Our dining table has always been something we looked forward to replacing, but DANG, tables are expensive...at least all the ones we looked at were. So we kept putting it off. Our friend Scott owns a furniture business and we get fantastic deals from him, but we still couldn't justify getting a nice new table...until now. Unfortunately, the cruddy economy has affected him and he's having to close his business. He decided to have one last blow out sale, with the lowest prices he's ever offered (even to friends and family, who usually get an extra deal). So, we checked the website and I just emailed my order...well, I just RE-emailed my order...I changed my mind about 30 minutes ago...here's what I was debating between:

I fell in love with this one the second I saw it. We have a black hutch, so our table has to be black too. This one has the contrast of the stained wood and the black painted wood, which I LOVE. It just seemed PERFECT...until I realized it wasn't square. For some reason, I love a square table.

So then we considered this one. It's square, but I just don't think it looks as nice as the other one. I had to decide what I wanted more, the shape I preferred or the look I preferred...I went for the look. I ordered the first one earlier this afternoon. Then, I went to the website to copy the pics just so I could blog about it and I saw another table that I hadn't noticed before...

This beauty has the contrast of the stained wood and the black paint, but it's ALSO square. It is the exact same price as the one I had already ordered, so I HAD to switch my order to this one. Isn't it pretty?!? And, it seats 8, what a great game table! We only got 6 chairs because it did start to get a little pricey, but even that is more than we have now. We're very excited to finally have a nice dining table and I just can't WAIT to get it!!

We're definitely sad to see Scott closing his doors. We had hoped he'd be our furniture guy forever. He has great stuff to offer and since he's a friend, we always knew we were getting a good deal. We even got our bedroom set (see below) and THE BEST MATTRESS EVER from him.