A switcheroo

Awhile back, I posted this post showcasing my un-packed kitchen. After living with it for a couple of months, I decided to do a little switcheroo (is that how it's spelled? no idea).

See, the kitchen table used to be in the middle of the room, allowing us to pull four seats up to it (even though it's a little tight). The butcher block island lived next to the windows and served as our primary prep space.  This worked fine, but I wanted to try a little experiment: I swapped the placement of the table and the island (dramatic, I know).

Here's how it looks, now.

 

The island now floats in the middle-ish of the room and continues to provide lots of prep space. The pantry is about 18" to the right of the island (can't see it in the photo), and there is plenty of space to easily stand between the island and the pantry, take out what we need, and set it on the island for prep. 

 

The table and chairs are tucked away against the wall, which seems to work pretty nicely. We moved the extra stools below the wire rack that stands over the radiator. There, they can easily be pulled up to the island while one or the other of us (let's be serious, while I) cooks for a glass of wine and a chat. Or, if we have friends over, we can pull the table out and add the two stools. This works much better for our daily needs.

This adjustment in furniture placement seems to give us a lot more space to walk around, and is a lot more efficient.  I think I was originally grieving the loss of our separate dining room, so I wanted to have plenty of room for friends to eat with us.  The reality is, though, that company is on the rare side, and we mainly use the table for our dinners together. Someday I'll have a dining room again, though, I'm sure of it!