Musical Rooms

Do you remember playing the game musical chairs as a kid? You know, you’d put a whole bunch of chairs in a circle, then somebody would sing a song until….STOP! And you’d have to scramble like mad to find a spot before that last seat was taken.

Often a fun game to play as a child, so I guess the adult version is what’s been happening around my house lately.

Except, instead of chairs, it’s rooms.

Let me explain.

My husband and I have been on a mission to rework the main spaces of our home.

We started by recognizing the areas that just didn’t seem to be working for us any longer, and strategizing new ways in which we can hopefully fix that, thus allowing us to enjoy our home a little while longer.

Do you want to know something really weird and slightly pathetic?

I actually have a reoccurring dream in which I discover an entirely new room in my house that I didn’t even know existed! Ha!

How’s that for internalizing your life’s events subconsciously?

While it may be my desired reality in dreamland, here in real life, my house is still the exact same square footage that it’s always been.

So the best solution we could come up with was to swap some rooms around – mainly the ones our family spends the most time in.

The Dining Room

Way back when we first built our house 10 years ago, we had a “formal” dining room. A space in which a fancy big oak table & chairs sat with a china hutch which was only used about 2 times a year – Thanksgiving & Christmas.

Well, fast forward 3 kids and a house full of toys later, and you can just about imagine where that “formal” room went — buh, bye.

All those years ago, we turned that room into a flex room and spend a lot more of our dining time right in the kitchen, where we have another dedicated space for a table and chairs.

As of most recent, this room was functioning as a kid/school/backpack/craft zone. But really it was just a big ol’ mess with a guinea pig cage shoved in the corner! Quite literally the sight of it was giving me a headache.

So that’s the room we decided to tackle first in this musical madness.

Our new strategy was to bring back the dining room! This time a little less stuffy, and a little more family oriented.

Our big dining table was moved out of our kitchen and back in the center of the dining room, along with the 4 chairs I refinished over the summer and a bench that fits snugly along one side, allowing for more leg room.

One wall houses the bottom half of a hutch that used to be in our office. It’s currently acting as storage for all my vases and pretty serving dishes. Above it I found a home for the vintage sheet music wreath I made and our vintage record player.

Then I moved our ladder shelves from my former office into this space too, flanking either side of the window. I’m a symmetry person, so I like equal balance when I’m looking at something.

These are great for displaying some of my cookbooks, favorite vintage items and even handmade treasures like the little red barn my daughter made at school.

Some additional changes I would like to make to this space eventually would be updating the light fixture and blinds. I also have a very cool vintage plate rack that I found at an estate sale that has been just waiting for it’s moment to arrive! Now that I’ve got this space to work with, I think it will look great in here once I’ve given it a little TLC.

Our kitchen now has a smaller round dining room table with 4 chairs, brought up from our basement, which makes this space feel about ten times bigger and more open.

The kids can still eat breakfast and lunch here, but mainly dinner will still be at our big table, in a new location just across the way.

So far, the other change to the dining space as been bringing in a vintage dresser that will act as a sideboard, for some much needed overflow kitchen storage. Can’t beat a cheap St. Vinny’s find!

It’s still in need of a new paint job, but I am excited for the potential it has to look pretty and be functional at the same time.

We are really liking this change so far. It’s already made us feel like we’ve increased the amount of usable, livable square footage in our home.

Do you have rooms in your home that you’ve swapped around a few times before or been tempted to try a new layout? Play some musical rooms! Sometimes a little change can really make a big impact on the way you’re using the spaces you live in.