A new dining room table, Part One

Our current dining room table was a $25 Craigslist find. It came with four chairs and a leaf, but it's still seats only 6, and that's a tight fit. Since we like to have people over, we wanted a bigger one.

Enter Bert, our bestest neighbor and woodworking genius. I've been looking for each in magazines for awhile, so we showed him some pictures, and he started sketching. The table will be 8 feet long by 3 1/2 feet wide. Yes, it's rather large. But I like it that way- more people can fit! It's made of pine, so that it has the character-inducing knots. Each end had a plank running perpendicular to the main boards, with plugs to add detail. Bert's designing it so that the legs are removable, since it's so big. (How cool is that? That was one of my ideas, but he worked it out.) There will also be a support beam that runs across the bottom and hooks into a beam at the ends, which doubles as a place to rest your feet. To top it off, Bert's making us benches too!!!

Doesn't it sound amazing? Like I said, Bert's the best. Of course we are compensating him, but just the fact that he's design and work on it (I might be picky...) is so darn awesome!! God really blessed us with a good neighbor.

Here it is coming together: