Gather

Deep down I have a heart for hospitality and hosting people in my home, though we don’t do it very often. In our previous house, we owned 7 dining room chairs, and 4 of them had pretty bad cracks. When we had friends over for a meal, we would pull out the Little Tikes plastic picnic table for the youngest kids to sit at, and put it in the living room.

So when we were house shopping this summer, I made sure to look for a place that was big enough to have multiple people over at a time. And I’m content with what we ended up with (hello big basement!).

I decided to go big, and after convincing my husband I wasn’t crazy, invited his family to gather at our new house for an early December Christmas-ish celebration (Sinterklaas specifically).

Problem: there will be 12 adults and 7 kids. Our dining table is in the corner of the kitchen, and really only has room for the 5 of us. We can make it work! I said.

And we will. Because I want this home to be a place where people gather. I want to be that house where my kids want to bring their friends on a Friday night.

One step at a time.

I checked Facebook Marketplace every couple of days for about a month, almost gave up, and finally came across a dining table and 8 chairs (two sets of 4) for only $125. It makes a great addition to our game/homework/dining room, and I’m excited to see how many friends and family we gather around it in the years to come.

We’re coming to that busy time of year… where will you gather with others over the next few months?

31Days of Five Minute Free Writes is a participation in Write31Days, and takes place every October. See the rest of my craft-practicing posts linked up here.