For my milestone 30th Birthday, my sweet husband made me a beautiful dining room table! (How was that two years ago? I'm getting old! Yikes!) I get a lot of compliments and questions on this particular piece, so I thought I would share a review of how I am LOVING it two years later.
First, let's share some of the back story. My inspiration was this lovely table below from Restoration Hardware. Lovely, but pricey! We figured we could make something ourselves that fit our room perfectly for a fraction of the cost!
I knew I wanted a table that could seat 8-10 and that was WIDE enough to fit serving dishes and a centerpiece with a fully set table. That being said, the table is 90 inches long and 46 inches wide. As you can see from the pictures above (taken last Thanksgiving), it absolutely accomplishes that goal!
Evan used cedar wood for the table, which at first I wasn't sure about because I didn't love the orange/red undertones. However, he stained with Sherwin William's "Woodscapes" Stain in the color "River Birch" and any trace of the red undertones disappeared completely. The color is perfect!
Yes, even in the process of making it, I always made sure that there were fresh flowers on the table!
We also designed it to use this bench that I scored from Pottery Barn Outlet a few years ago, since we only had 6-chairs and we wanted the table to seat 8. Worked perfectly!
He made the top of the table and the legs outside in the garage, and then assembled and stained when it was inside. In a super old house like ours, there is no fitting anything through the narrow doors and hallways!
I'm not always a fan of make-it-yourself furniture because it can look a little too homemade in comparison to store bought pieces in the same room (which is how I feel about my desk and TV stand, but I'll share those thoughts another day!), however, this table is definitely my favorite piece of furniture in our house. Believe me, that is saying a lot!
The other thing I love about this table is the durability. We put several coats of poly on top of the stain, and you could do just about anything to this table without damaging it! Very kid, husband, and craft project friendly!
