table talk

Just a follow up on my kitchen table.  If I thought it was a mess before, that was nothing compared to the results after two boys cut out numerous paper snowflakes.  The scraps on the floor and table look more like snow than the pieces taped to the window.   Red, blue, purple, black and green snow.  (FYI: Don't eat green snow.)

I consented to keeping the bean plants which have sprouted in their plastic cups of polymers.  I 'm a sucker for green plants I guess.  I'm less accommodating to worms.  I decided that the worms were lonely for their outdoor home.  I wasn't sure there were still worms in the bug box, but there didn't appear to be any Halloween pumpkin left in it either.  Instead there were some bugs getting attracted to it. 

I asked Bug to take it outdoors since today finally had pleasant weather after all our cold and then rain.  He used a stick to scrape out the dirt mud compost rotted pumpkin and found all the worms.  I told him they'd be happy going home. Or maybe they liked it better indoors in the warmth than they do outside, I don't really know the mind of a worm. Doesn't matter.  They're off my kitchen table finally.

The boys had holiday parties at school yesterday and their last day today.  (Don't ask me why they don't save the craziness and just celebrate on the last day; I'm sure there were no academics today.)  We have emptied the book bags and put them away until January.  Of course, there are  now candy canes and cards and bits of crafts all over the table.  Maybe my kitchen table is shy and just doesn't want to show itself.

But!  I have been getting new tables!

My parents new home is near a strip of antique and consignment shops.  I went with my mom for the first time several weeks ago and I found a new coffee table for our den.  I loved the size of our old table when we ate in the den, and I loved that it held so many books and magazines.  I disliked the height, which was too high to put feet on, and I'd never loved the style of the table. I also disliked bumping my shin on it every time I walked past because it was too big for the room.  The new table was intended to be an end table, so my properly retired father cut the legs down and refinished the top.  It now sits in our den, covered with books and magazines so no one can see it.  But we know it's there and my feet like getting propped up on it.  It won't hold us when we sit in the den for a movie night, but we'll learn to cope.

My parents, like properly retired people, sometimes go browsing in the antique shops. This is how CD and I received a phone call two weeks ago telling us that there was an antique Victorian dining room table now marked down to $250.  Did we want to come see it?

The store had so much Stuff that my kitchen table would have felt inferior.  Not a spot of table was visible under what, I was told, could be several thousand dollars worth of knick knacks.  But my parents had seen Potential.  CD and I tossed the kids in the car and went to see it.  Sure enough, good quality solid walnut.  Slightly wider than our current too-small table, and with four leaves.  The owners cleared the table of all the pricier Stuff.  And, we bought it. 

My dad has been refinishing the top for us. (Doesn't retirement sound good?)  The base is in pretty good shape and shows less anyway.  He's told us that we can come pick it up this weekend.  Maybe we'll put a big red ribbon on it and treat it like a Christmas present!