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bigger family in really small dining area?


caedmyn
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Has anyone found a good way to fit a bigger family into a small dining area?  Our dining area is the right size for a breakfast nook...except we need to fit 6, and soon 7, people in there.  Our table and chairs fit, but it's tight enough that no one except the person at the head of the table and the ends nearest can get out once everyone is seated, which seems to cause a lot of drama from someone always needing to get out for some reason.  

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I have a friend who had six kids in a small townhouse.  They got a couple bar stools and two kids sat at a counter (I don't think it had an actual overhang).  The kids would take turns sitting there for dinner and being 'waiter' for the rest of the family (because it was too hard to get up and move around the table).    You could also be like the olden days, feed the littles ones early and put them to bed and everybody else eats later!  Or have kids eat all at once and you and dh eat later!

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My friend has a high square table which seems to seat a lot of people in a small space.  You can fit two chairs on each edge for a total of eight.  (Looks like this)

 

We have a small dining nook and it fits four comfortably....five if we add in an extra chair, but it's squished.  We use bar stools in the kitchen area or usually I just eat standing as I'm cooking, serving, cleaning.  (Not ideal, I know.)

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Could you use benches instead of chairs? It can be easier to slide out to let someone else out and they usually take up less space.  I work for a family who uses a bench at the back of their table - the bench is against the wall. It's super easy to slide in but takes up little space. 

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Is there another room off the kitchen where you could put your table -- and then turn the breakfast nook into a small sitting room?

 

Or look at your chair size.  Maybe you can get more narrow chairs?  Some dining chairs are absolutely enormous, and much larger than they need to be.  Benches can fit more people in on the sides, but they do make it difficult for the person in the middle to get out.

 

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Is there another room off the kitchen where you could put your table -- and then turn the breakfast nook into a small sitting room?

 

Or look at your chair size.  Maybe you can get more narrow chairs?  Some dining chairs are absolutely enormous, and much larger than they need to be.  Benches can fit more people in on the sides, but they do make it difficult for the person in the middle to get out.

 

That's basically what we did once our fifth child was old enough to eat at the table.  We used basically half of our living room as the dining area, and moved our smaller couch and a bookshelf into what had been the dining area.  It made a nice, sunny reading spot, which was great as I was teaching the twins to read that year.  The new dining set-up was still in a corner though, and my 3 bigger kids sat on a bench, so there was still a fair bit of drama about getting in and out of their places at the table.

 

When we went house hunting, a big dining room was high on my priority list - the kids and I spend a lot of our time in there each day.

 

 

Edited by rebbyribs
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We often have 6 in an apartment sized spot for a dining table (two adults, two teens plus kids ages 8 and 11).  We keep a bench against one kitchen wall and pull it out as needed. Three people on the bench, two on chairs on the other side and one perched at the end.  

 

The table itself folds down if we require more space during the day. I love that feature.

 

 

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I'd forego the traditional route and get creative with space. Can you repurpose your living area in any way? A large coffee table with older people on upholstered furniture and little ones on kid chairs? Or expanding your kitchen island into the breakfast nook so that everyone can sit around it? If you have a LR AND a FR, can one be turned into a Library/Dining space?The Ikea catalog always has fun ideas for seating ten in a tiny apartment

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We have benches around two sides of our square table and the benches are actually attached to the walls. The other two sides have two chairs each. So, we fit 10 people at an '8 seater' table. We can even squeeze more in on occasions. Having the benches attached to the walls means the table can sit closer into the corner allowing more space in our small dining room.

Edited by LindaOz
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We have this table with 2 benches and 2 chairs (scroll through the pics to see the variations): https://www.walmart.com/ip/Better-Homes-and-Gardens-Autumn-Lane-Farmhouse-Dining-Table-Black-and-Oak/17618606 . We only have 5 in our family but we can easily sit 8 at this table when we have people over. Three people per bench. We've had it for years and it's been great!

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We have a table with two benches. That was the only way to fit five kids and two adults.

 

https://www.ashleyfurniturehomestore.com/p/strumfeld-dining-room-table/d588-45/

 

This picture shows the table and benches we chose. We liked the chairs from another dining set better, so we got those instead of the ones pictured.

Edited by extendedforecast
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Yes, like people have already said, benches! I know a family with an old church pew for their bench. It's nice because it has a back, though it's a climb to get in and out, so only kids sit there. A little climbing won't hurt them. Another family has 2 handmade benches, a handmade table, and just chairs at the head and foot of the table.

 

Don't give up meals all sitting together. It's worth the hassle.

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Around here a lot of people have benches. They usually run along the wall so there is no issue with falling off etc (at least no more than with chairs, probably less). Often there is a bench on two sides and chairs on the other two (you generally can fit two chairs on the longer side and one on the shorter (total of three) and probably four on the bench (especially kids). Of course you could get/build a bigger size (depending on your space). Often there is a storage area under the benches (as they are not easily moveable.

 

Here is an example of what I am thinking off (Just picked something off the internet):

https://www.sediarreda.com/de/p-av2gno-av-giropanca?art_var=01P5NATU&utm_areaiso=DEU&gclid=CPC0rsvl7tICFTAo0wodYSYJbw

 

If you click on the smaller picture you will see the bigger version(obviously you wouldn't want to get it from overseas - it is just meant to illustrate what I am talking about).

Edited by Twolittleboys
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Ok people with benches, are they just a nightmare with kids?   The fighting, the touching, the falling off, the getting up and off of them.    How is it really living with them?

 

Our kitchen is our main school area, so we use the table all day long. 

 

That's one of my concerns too.  Right now our table is long enough that there's a space big enough for another person between each kid (two on each side), and they still bicker.  I don't know if I want to put them all right on top of each other like bench seating would require...

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When we had a smaller dining area we used to put the little toddler kids at a tiny table off to the side. If we had had benches then, (we do now), that would've helped a lot too. I also visited a friend's home and she had some people sit at the counter on stools and the rest around a square table with narrow chairs.

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Ok people with benches, are they just a nightmare with kids? The fighting, the touching, the falling off, the getting up and off of them. How is it really living with them?

 

Our kitchen is our main school area, so we use the table all day long.

Just be systematic with which children should and should not sit next to one another. We have assigned "seats" on our benches and periodically change them if things aren't working out the way they are. As far as getting off and on or falling, we haven't much had that issue.

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We flipped the dining room and family room. We had another living room and so it worked fine for a couch and TV and then eventually it became a den. Well once it as a sewing room. Ok actually we called it the room of requirement because it was 😂

 

Anyways when my MiL suggested moving the table to what was the family room (open to the kitchen) I thought she was crazy. But the dining room drove me crazy with 4 kids and homeschooling around it too. So I figured I had nothing to lose and could put it back. It was they best thing we ever did. We left that house with 8 kids and meals were always comfortable and we had plenty of room for guests. And I could move around and help with school and the toddlers could play on the floor. And it was much quieter than the dining room with 3 full walls and a small arch on the fourth.

 

Of course this might not apply to you but just an idea to think outside the box. If I had a nook that I didn't want to use as our main table I would likely put a computer desk there.

Edited by busymama7
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Two more things:

 

The family that now lives in that house has 9 kids and they also use that room for dining and homeschooling. They also have a folding school lunchroom table (ten feet long, benches on each side, folds in half) and I loved it so much I got one too. We use it in our new house in the eat in kitchen. Most meals happen there and all messy projects. So easy to fold and clean the floor. It has made my life SO much easier.

 

We use the dining room for dinners when dad is home, 1-2x a week but if he was home nightly we would use it more. We also use the dining room for school as the folding table is just too narrow for more than 2-3 kids to spread out books etc.

In the dining room we have two hand made 3ft by 6ft table pushed together to form a square. 2 benches on two sides and up to 3 chairs per other side. We can easily fit 12-14 people there as long as some are kids. I love the benches for that reason. The table can also be used as a long 12 ft table when our space allows (it doesn't right now)

 

Just in case any of this is helpful. Comfortable dining is the most important thing in my home especially as we school at the table too. (Tried a school room with desks but that didn't work for us)

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Ok people with benches, are they just a nightmare with kids?   The fighting, the touching, the falling off, the getting up and off of them.    How is it really living with them?

 

Our kitchen is our main school area, so we use the table all day long. 

 

Are these things already a problem with your kids? If not, I don't see why benches would introduce these behaviors. If these things are already an issue, well, you're already dealing with it. 

 

I know I'm dating myself but back when we were raising kids I was a stickler for civility at the table.  Dh worked hard to earn the money for the food and I worked hard to prepare a nice meal. I wasn't about to tolerate rowdy kids. Sometimes that meant a kid couldn't eat with us and had to wait until we were done to have her food reheated in the microwave and she sat alone.  (It was almost always a two meal punishment because the first time was due to the kid interrupting a meal with poor behavior. So the second meal alone was to reinforce that I meant business.) 

 

But as a first step to avoid issues, you could put painter's tape on the benches to mark off each seat so personal space was well defined. 

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Ok people with benches, are they just a nightmare with kids?   The fighting, the touching, the falling off, the getting up and off of them.    How is it really living with them?

 

Our kitchen is our main school area, so we use the table all day long. 

 

We have a VERY small dining area. Our table isn't all that small. It fits 6 chairs, and there are 5 of us. So it would be big enough, except that we have to keep the table against the wall to be able to walk through the dining area to get to the kitchen, so we rarely pull it out. So we only have 4 seats in constant use, lol.  Dh isn't home for most meals. He works during dinner more than he is home for it. And breakfasts or lunches that he is here we just pull the table out to eat. 

 

But that isn't relevant. To answer, when we do have extra kids over, which is often, we use the piano bench instead of the chairs to squeeze more in. We can get two on the bench plus one in a chair putting three on a long side of table instead of 2. If we had a longer bench we could put 4 along one side and just get rid of two chairs. And it actually works quite well. Kids who complain in cars about touching and whatnot do ok together at the table on the bench. I have thought about watching for longer benches on sale to just replace some of the chairs permanently. For us, since the table is tucked against the wall with the two chairs penned against the wall between the table and wall, a bench on that side makes more sense. It would just be tucked under the table during the day.

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I have a pretty small dining area. We have a rectangular table with benches on either side. Since my space is not perfectly square, I have chairs on either end as well, so we can seat 8 pretty comfortably. I tuck the benches under the table when not in use and it saves space.

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Yep.  We had seven in our family growing up.  Eating area was tiny.  Three of us sat on a bench along one wall.  Older brothers sat in chairs: one on the end against another wall, the other on the side.  Dad sat on the open end, and Mom sat on the side next to older brother, nearest the rest of the kitchen so she could jump up and down as needed.  No drama was allowed, and no one ever got up once we were seated.  (Dad was kind of a tyrant.)   My mom still owns that house, and I look at that space and wonder how in the world we all fit there, but we did.

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