Tina Jay Photography | Philadelphia Wedding Photographer

J and I moved into our house back in March, but we still have a LOT of things to buy to fill up our home.  We were crammed in a studio in center city before we bought the house, so our house was preeeetty bare when we first moved in.  We're slowly accumulating the things we need to fill our house, but it's definitely still a work in progress and will take us a while to get there.  One of the first things we wanted to buy was a dining room table, because our dining room was completely empty......until this weekend!

We figured a dining room table is a pretty big investment, and it's one of those pieces of furniture that is going to stick with you for a looooong time.  So when we were trying to figure out which store to buy our dining room table from, we were having a tough time choosing.  It wasn't until we visited my Grandparents for Easter that it hit me - we should ask my Uncle to make us our dining room table!  My Uncle is an AMAZING wood-worker - he has made countless pieces of furniture and other items in my Grandparent's house, all of which I absolutely love.  He is SO good that he made everything in his house - like, literally everything.  He built his house from the ground up, from the cabinets in his kitchen, to specialty chairs, and even all of the windows.  Yep, he made all of the windows in his house out of wood and glass from an old chicken coop on my Aunt's farm .  How crazy is that?

He is an incredibly talented guy, and I recommend anyone contacting him if they want an amazingly crafted piece of custom furniture.  So you can only imagine how excited I was to come home from my wedding on Saturday night, since he delivered it to us Saturday afternoon.  J emailed me a picture of the table while I was at the wedding, so I was trying to furiously download on my iPhone during dinner at the reception, but it's just not the same as when you see it in person.  Here is the final product:

I love everything about this table.  I love how you can see the grain in the wood, all the natural knots of the wood, and all of the different size boards he used.  He did EXACTLY what we asked him to do, yet it still turned out better than I ever could have imagined.

Then if you need more room, you just pull the ends out on each side, to insert the extensions:

This table is looooong once you open it all the way up - I think we figured out you could seat 14 people around this thing!  Love it!

I think it looks awesome how the boards of the extensions run perpendicular (never thought I'd use that word again after geometry) to the boards of the main part of the table.

Again, love the rustic look of the boards - we wanted the "rustic" feel of the natural wood, but at the same time wanted to be able to set a plate or glass on the table without it tipping over - it came out perfectly.

So if you couldn't tell already, I am in LOVE with our new table.  We still don't have chairs, but that is just a minor detail:)  We'll get there!

If anyone is interested in having furniture or anything that would be made of out of wood custom made by my uncle, just CONTACT ME and I'll set you up with him:)

Grandparents are pretty much the best thing ever. They spoil you rotten when you're younger, they teach you life lessons without you even realizing it, and they're just always there for you. No matter what. I feel so lucky and fortunate to still be able to spend time with all 4 of my grandparents - they're all still so active, and it's great to be able to take little vacations together each year. Whether it's hanging out in the middle of no where at my one set of Grandparent's cabin, or going to the beaches of Florida and North Carolina with my other set of Grandparents, they're always the vacations I look forward to the most.

But besides all of the usual reasons I love my grandparents, here is a random thing I love: they still write me hand-written letters. Who sends actual letters in the mail any more? My grandparents do! And I LOVE it - I always get so excited when I get a hand written note - like the same kind of excited when you used to get when you'd get care packages in the mail when you were in college (my sister ROCKED at those!).

Here is one they wrote to J and I:

I love this letter so much that I hung it up on the board right next to my computer.  It just makes me smile every time I look at it:)

My Grandpa and J always talk sports.  If there are two people that love to chat, it's J and my Grandpa.  They could go on and on and on about sports for hours on end.  I thought it was so nice and thoughtful of my Grandpa that he sent a newspaper clipping and a little note to J:)

Love you guys!  Can't wait until our beach vaca in 1.5 weeks:)