Rearranging

Ever wake up and realize you've been doing something all wrong?

That was something we came to terms with this past weekend after hosting a dinner party wherein everyone stood almost the entire night because- ultimately- our furniture arrangement was wrong.

Our two living spaces are hard spaces to fill; the formal living room has a curved bay window framed by stairs and a fireplace, but it's basically open to the front door with no real delineation between where living space ends and front entry begins... and there's a traffic path to the master bedroom cutting right through it all.

Our "family" room is even more awkward, sharing what is our main dining space with an area that was designed to be a more casual living room with a media space contained in a floor-to-ceiling built-in bookshelf. It has an angled fireplace, a weird zigzag corner, two cased openings into the kitchen, and a backdoor to contend with... not to mention a wall of windows.

We've tried all kinds of arrangements in the past; a sectional in the family room, upholstered chairs, a couch-love seat combo with a coffee table... there was always something not quite right about it all. And after dinner this weekend we realized it still wasn't right. So we started thinking outside the box, and I think we finally figured it out, y'all...

Once we stopped worrying about the bookshelf-as-entertainment-center and just started thinking about how we use the space(s), it all fell in to place. We moved our dining table into the smaller, more intimate (and more awkward) area near the bookshelf, and we brought the bulky, more casual sectional into the "dining" area (so now there is a good place to sit, open to the kitchen, for when people are visiting and mingling- yay). We then moved our newer, more formal couches into the formal living room. It all makes more sense and the flow is really nice. We just need to rethink our rugs and coffee tables, but that can come with time.

I just love freshening up spaces and improving function! And bonus: we got to vacuum those netherland areas under the couches, so everything is cleaner now, too! A 100% humidity, 99-degree day well spent inside, if I do say so myself.