Great Fun etc: New Around Here

My parents move into their miracle house on Sunday.
It's a "miracle" house because who would have ever thought they would find somewhere nice (and affordable) to buy in Auckland... on a pension?

They've bought a lovely place with my sister, where they will have their own two-bedroom unit with polished wood floors, a conservatory and a good-sized yard for when the grandkids visit.

In my mum's old kitchen in Palmerston North, there once dwelled a huge farmhouse table, large enough to seat ten people comfortably around it. In my mum's new kitchen, well, lets just say that huge tables are a bit surplus to requirements.

What to do, what to do? Mum and dad love their huge farmhouse table, parting would be a wrench. But even more of a problem was where to store it until they could sell it.
Did we have room in our garage???

Er, sadly, no. Our "garage" is filled with bikes and foozeball tables and kayaks and crap. We're lucky to squeeze ourselves in there while we hunt for stuff.

But I had another solution.
How about if we put the table in our dining room... and mum and dad could take our small extendable one? Just temporary, of course.

The plan met with favour on all sides.
Off went Mr G and Grandad to swap one extendable table for one giant one.
I had no idea whether it would fit in our oddly-shaped dining room.

Well... it did. And immediately we all fell in love with the giant farmhouse dining table. The kids ran to set it for dinner straightaway... well, some of them did. Others just sat there slurping.

"Is this our new table to keep???!!!" they all wanted to know.
"We have to wait and see if Nan likes our table in her new house," we told them cautiously, fingers crossed and praying silently *please let her love it*

Why such a big fuss about a dining table? Why a whole post on some furniture?

Well, let's just say that it solves a nightly mealtime battle.
We had four matching chairs, and one wonky one that nobody wanted to sit on.
Every night there was a race for the "good" chairs, and a wrangle over who would sit on the crappy one.

But Nan's dining table comes with six matching chairs. They even have cushions.

We remind Nan each time she comes to see us and admires ~~our~~ her lovely giant farmhouse table, that this way she still gets to have the table in her life. Dinner at our house. Christmas. Cuppa teas.
See? Works for everyone.

I love the table - it's giant size, its rusticness, its six matching chairs (with cushions).
But even more I love that my mum and dad have found a home at last... and that it's just ten minutes drive (in good traffic) from our house.

I love having my parents living in my town; I love that my kids have grandparents in their lives on a day-to-day basis. I love that sometimes the gate creaks and up the driveway walks my ma and pa, dropping by for a cuppa. I am so blessed.

That's what's new around here.

Oh. And these...