dining room updates

I've been meaning to tell you, my mom is a genius. Of course I knew this already, but let me just share with you her latest example of genius-ness.

I am generally happy with my dining room and the church pew works like a charm to corral the girls during dinner but there was one small problem with the layout. When anyone over the age of 16 sat at the pew, they had a good chance of knocking their head against the mirror before dessert was served.

So often I would blather to my mom on the phone about wanting to put something behind the bench to create a bit of breathing room between guests and the big O (that would be the mirror, not Oprah). A console would be perfect, but I can't find a console that is as long as the bench and isn't thousands of dollars. Blah blah blah. It was probably around this point in the conversation that my mom would tell me she had to go so she didn't have to listen to this conversation...yet again.

Then we were downstairs (pre-family room makeover) and she said, "What about this console for behind the pew?" Uh, that's not long enough mom, duh. And it's too deep. To which the smarty pants said, "not if you cut it in half."

Mind blown.

I should clarify that this woman is a furniture lover of the first degree and doesn't normally condone furniture mutilation. But this particular piece was a random HomeGoods buy (we all have a few of those around the house) and is by no means precious.

So of course I took that sucker outside as quickly as I could, measured to find the exact middle of the table and asked the hubs to buzz that sucker in half. We kept the tape down as he cut to prevent any splitting and in no time flat I had myself one. long. console.

Although each side of the now super long console still had two legs to hold it up, it was a bit wobbly. To remedy this we just screwed each side of the console into the wall to hold it in place and we were done.

So nothing earth shattering but now all of my dinner guests can enjoy themselves without bonking their head in the middle of an animated story. (we host a lot of animated storytellers at our house). And really I'm a fan of little updates to a room. It feeds my constant appetite for change without chucking a room and starting over again every few months ($$$$$$)

The runner is a temporary one I made from fabric leftovers and extra ribbon. It will hang out until I find a more permanent replacement one day.

What about you? Do you make a lot of little changes around the house to pacify the 'itch'? Ever cut a piece of furniture in half? I'm willing to rent my mom out to anyone who needs her, although maybe I should ask her first.