Bloggy tour of homes week 3

This week our tour features dining rooms. I love that when you first enter our home, the first thing you see is the view above. The dining room is a large trapezoidal room which is a little unique and it gives a very open feel as the room flows right up to the entrance and the living room. I have many of my favorite items in this room the largest being the dining room set its self.

The set is red oak with black walnut inlays and decorative metal components so that it has the arts and crafts feel and style of both Frank Lloyd Wright and Charles Rennie Mackintosh. This set was actually designed by Robert Sonneman and was marketed under the name Urban Primitive. Just before it went out of production I was able to get three pieces, the table and chairs, the sideboard & hutch and the buffet table. To this day I've never seen a dining room set that I've loved as much as this one.

Eammon's favorite part of the room is the view out of the French doors. He loves to sit at the head of the table, looking out...Except when the geese come knocking and begging as they see us sitting in there.

Also in the room are three leather giraffes, the largest being the same height as I. We named the giraffes but we obviously aren't very creative as the largest one is named Gia as in gia-raffe... The mid-sized giraffe is Gia-too and the small one is Baby. To further display our lack of creativity, the bunny and pig that you can just see under the antique radio, they're named Bun and Pig. I know, we're losers and it's amazing that we're going to be allowed to name a child all by ourselves!

Another favorite of mine are these three drawings that were done by my maternal grandfather. It's interesting that in all the homes where I've displayed these, I've always hung them vertically. I guess that's just how I always see them in my mind and it's amazing because in each of my homes, there's always been the perfect spot to hang them. If you look off to the right, you'll see the entrance to the master suite and of course a giraffe painting greets you as you enter that space.

In addition to my love of giraffes, I also have a bit of a chair fetish. I love chairs that are unique, even if somewhat impractical like the one pictured to the right. When I first saw this chair I just fell in love with it and had to have it and I've always been able to find a spot to display it. The built in shelves surrounding the French doors give me lots of space to display some of my trinkets and helps to keep all my clutter in one spot.

Last but not least are my lady & man chairs which flank the sides of the sideboard & hutch.

Above the chairs are some paintings that Eammon always teases me about, telling me that they look like ladies with willies, but I'll let you be the judge on that one.

Here are some pictures of the room before we bought our home. These were taken on the day that we did our pre-purchase inspection. The previous owners used what we use as the dining room as their living room.

Well, that concludes this week's tour, join me next Friday when we look at kitchens.

Previous bloggy tour home posts:
Week 2: Living rooms/ Family rooms/ dens
Week 1: Foyers/ Entrances