Living Room with Fireplace Converted to Dining Room

So, I took a really long posting break, and I have a lot to catch up on. But I figured I would start out with something easy.

The dining room has been done (well, mostly done) for a really long time, but I haven't posted about it. When we bought the house it was originally the living room, with what was the formal living and dining on the other side of the house and the kitchen in the middle.  But the layout really didn't work well - it would have been awkward to put sofas in there because the room is so narrow and there was definitely no good place to put the tv for maximum viewing enjoyment. So the formal living and dining became the family room and office/playroom and the living room became the dining room.

It was actually a very simple change - all it involved was changing out the existing ceiling fan with a chandelier, which we got done a few weeks before Christmas.

I looked all over the web for inspiration pictures of dining rooms with fireplaces, but I eventually just did what I did and didn't worry that I will probably never use the fireplace. So here are some before pics - these were before we moved in and so contain the previous owners things:

And here's what it looks like now (well, with a few minimalist Christmas decorations in the mix. . .)

Bam! Instant dining room! I love that the only major thing I had to do was have an electrician install a chandelier. Here's a few more pics:

My husband was doing yard work the day I put up Christmas decorations and so I snagged some branches from the throwaway pile. I was proud of my wintery, Better-Homes-and-Gardeny display.

Because I hate it when I see something in a picture and I have no idea where it came from, I will not put my few readers through this same torture. Here's a quick breakdown:

Chandelier - Home Depot
Rug - Joss and Main
Chair Covers - World Market (and by the way, you may have noticed they don't fit perfectly, which is because they are regular old wooden back chairs but I wanted to break up all the wood in there with some color)
Mirror and white pitcher on fireplace - Homegoods (as did the awesome table and lamp that you totally can not see in any pictures - I'll have to post some some day)
Curtains and candle stands on fireplace - IKEA
Cat - from Hell (she can actually be very sweet, and she is kind of cute, but she does belong to the Dark Side)

Stay tuned! I am *still* working on the kitchen (winter/spring planting is going to put me behind on that one) and I did a quick redo of the upstairs bathroom, so I will post that soon!