Thanks for all the work everyone has put into helping us with this dilemma. We've hated this poorly laid out room since we've gotten here, especially my wife. Now we've gotten a ton of help and good ideas and can actually get excited about making this space more functional and attractive.

Love May’s design. Side tables over radiators with lamps in windows, so pretty. And, plenty of room to expand dining table for larger groups. Yay

Sorry I spelled your name wrong Mae.

Hi Quentin. Just found your post. A challenging tool, no doubt. Mae’s work on the 3-D rendering is wonderful. She is so kind. One question I have is the desk seems to be missing in the layout. Can you use a room upstairs for your office?

Tool = room.

@Seajay Sparkles Thanks! We're hoping to use a spare bedroom for an office, but the upstairs isn't finished yet, so the desk has to stay for now. To be honest, it's convenient to have it downstairs so it may end up staying permanently.

Would a different style desk work for you? I'm thinking of one that could sit in front of the fireplace and serve as a game table too (bigger than what's shown below.) You might try it with your current desk to see how much space is available. May depend on your need to be plugged in while working. Mae did a wonderful job making two pretty rooms! I think you may need all the square footage you can get if you're a growing family, but the two rooms could be flipped back if the need arises. Best to just start trying out some of the suggestions, living with each one for a couple of days and seeing what works best for you right now. That will also help you decide if you want new furniture or to use the stored things. New and fresh would be fun if you can afford to wait for out of stock items. This is not really a good time for ordering anything much! Shopping 2nd hand can be rewarding though.

Beach Style Living Room · More Info

@decoenthusiaste Thanks for the suggestions! I wouldn't have thought to put the desk in front of the fireplace, but that would be a good use of space. I'll try it out there and see. I don't think it would be too far from the outlet.

We're definitely a growing family as we're expecting another baby, and hope to have more. The toys and mess aren't going away anytime soon and we really like having that end of the room set aside for a play area.

Yes, this isn't a good time for ordering things new. We're just starting out so we almost always shop second hand anyhow. It takes much longer, and it's harder to find just the right thing, but we also hate buying something nice and new and having the toddler color on it first thing. We've gotten a lot of ideas on here for things to keep an eye out for.

Yes, I'll try to approximate all the layouts suggested here with the furniture we currently have, just so we can get a general idea of how we like it and whether we could live with it. I did try out your suggestion of placing the couch with the back toward the dining room but I forgot to post the pics. I'll do that below. It looks bad with this beast of a coffee table, but would work with smaller furniture and it does make room for two chairs and possibly a bookshelf against the corner wall. The more bookshelves we can fit in the better.

Smaller scale pieces will make all the difference! You can see the leather chair is better sized for the area. You're a good sport to give the arrangement a shot; lots of potential for your space once you get the right furniture pieces. Don't be afraid to leave some simple spaces for the eye to rest.

Hi... is your sofa bumping out into the walkway? If end table were removed, would a hanging lamp shade work?

Brightech Montage - Bedroom & Living Room Floor Lamp - Reading Standing Light, O · More Info

I'm confused cause Idk why sofa can't switch with 2 chairs - would that fit better? ticking type cover --

Classic Slipcovers Brushed Twill 1-Piece Loveseat Slipcover Stripe Red · More Info

ah... or... ha!?

Double Sofa Cover, Elastic Sofa Couch Throws Slipcovers, Dustproof Sofa Cover · More Info

@everdebz Thanks! A floor lamp could fit in that corner where the end table is. I just didn't bother moving it out, but we definitely wouldn't keep it in that corner if we went with this arrangement. We would put a bookshelf against that wall and a lamp would probably fit. Slipcovers are great with an ugly old sofa like this; my wife has one that she sticks on when we have company. I'm not entirely sure what you mean about switching the sofa with two chairs. Do you mean in the arrangement I just tried out above? I did try the sofa against the radiator, if that's what you mean. Here's a pic. You're right that in the other arrangement it is blocking the walk way, but with a smaller sofa it may work.

I've been meaning to post pictures of the rooms arranged as @Mae Day Organizing and Interior Design suggested (just with the furniture we have) Here are some of the dining table in what was the living room. The play area has stayed in the same place on the far side of the room.

We eat at the kitchen table and never use our dining table unless we have company. We haven't yet had a chance to see if having the dining table farther from the kitchen is inconvenient.

Here's the new living room (old dining room).

It usually takes a some time to get used to the changes. The living room looks great!! Do you and your wife like it? It would be nice to take the piture that is to the left of the front door and hang it over the piano. Also, can the matching white chair go where the orange leather chair is now or is it too big? I would like to suggest turning the area rug around so that the part that is curled up will be against the back wall where it can't trip anyone.

Preferably the larger of the two paintings for over the piano. Than the other one in the corner next to the book shelf. I did not remember the large bookshelf being there before.

Would you be willing to remove the leafs in the table and corner it like it is in the rendition? That would give you much more room to walk through.

Thanks for all the help and suggestions @Mae Day Organizing and Interior Design! Here is the table with the leaves down. It's not square so it doesn't really fit in the corner but we could move it back farther toward the wall.

The bookshelf wasn't here before. We found it on Marketplace recently and have been trying to figure out where it fits best. Switching the dining and living rooms seems to be the only way to free up wall space for it.

The white chair is a lot larger than the leather one and sticks out into the walkway. It might fit if the piano was centered. I need to center it, but it's heavy and I don't want to scratch the floor. We do have another (matching) leather chair in the attic we could bring down if we need to. Would that work better near the kitchen doorway? We can move the picture also. As far as the rug goes, unfortunately the other side of the rug is worse. We probably should replace it but we're all used to that edge now. Nothing we've tried has made it lie flat. Most of our things are kind of old and bedraggled. :)

That looks much better! Please tell me the measurement of the table. There are moving sliders that you can put under the piano to help move it. I use them to move heavy objects and prevent scratches on the wooden floor. They are around and can be found at a store like bed Bath and beyond. I am putting together another rendition with furniture that is closer to what you have. Just so you can see what it will look like with things more like yours. MAE

I am believe the two red chairs in the living room would look better with the couch but let me finish with the rendition first before you do that. Can you give me the measurements of that little chair?

As far a whether we like it, it's hard to say yet. The arrangement works really well and having the dining table in the larger area frees up a lot of wall space. All the living room furniture fits well in the dining room (with room for another end table and lamp, just need to bring it down from upstairs). It's very comfortable.

Having the dining table in the living room gives us a lot more room for extra seating and expanding the table. Most of our friends have tons of kids so this is a good thing. The old dining room felt very cramped, and we hated asking people to squeeze back to the chairs along the outside wall.

We like to have people over to sing, which makes having the piano in the living room really convenient. Only problem is this room is a little tight, but I suppose we could push the dining table back and expand out into there.

The only cons are:

1. The dining room is farther from the kitchen. Probably not a big deal.

2. It's a little weird having the baby's play space in a separate area from the sofas. We find we end up sitting on the stairs a lot more, so we can watch her, or not using the living room at all. This evening I was reading aloud to the family and just pulled a dining chair between the two rooms so we could be with her whichever place she ended up playing. That aspect is a little inconvenient.

3. If we leave it this way what do we do about the light fixtures? There's not one over the table where it is in the front room and I already put up a fan in the center of that room. We would definitely need lamps at least; the overhead light doesn't do much. We were going to replace the brass chandelier in the dining room with something else. I assume future owners will consider this a dining room and it might be hard to find a fixture that looks okay for either a living room or dining room.

I am trying to come up with a place for the bookshelves as well. Let’s see what we can come up with Quintin.

Sorry The program misspelled your name Quentin

Thanks, @Mae Day Organizing and Interior Design With the leaves down the table is 28" x 45". Do you need the measurements for the table with the leaves up?

I agree. I see that the piano has rollers on the legs and they can dig into the wooden floor.

The leather chair is appx 26" deep and 25 wide.

I know we have a slipcover for the sofa but I don't know what color it is.

Before we switched the rooms we did try the bookshelf on the outside wall. It looked a little dark and bulky, but maybe that was the picture behind it.

Putting the sofa against the radiator made the long skinny room look more long and skinny.

Quentin, I am working on this but the bookcases are an issue. I know you are working on the upstairs but is there a chance that you can put any of them up there when you are done. I understand about wanting to sit with the baby while she plays. I usually ended up sitting on the floor with them because our house was so small.

I am going to need to say good evening for the day and get back to you tomorrow. See you then.

Thanks for all your help, Mae. Folding down the table leaves gives us a lot more space and keeps me from banging into that corner that was jutting into the walkway, which I've done an embarrassing amount of times. Safer for the toddler too.

We do have two shelves up there already but we have the same problem upstairs with not enough wall space. Might be able to fit it in the guest room/office. Every room in this house is full of doors, low windows, and radiators and it makes furniture placement challenging. We are a family that loves books and between my wife and I we probably have enough to fill at least five floor to ceiling bookshelves. These days I only collect ebooks though and that makes things simpler. :)

Could we stick the shelf in the toy area if we need to? We tried it there briefly in the place of the skinny one. Here's a picture.

Quentin, I am going to send you a link to the rendition tomorrow morning. When I do I will send you instructions on how to open it up so you can do a three-dimensional walk-through. I hope your wife can join you so you can both look at it and let me know what you like or don’t like. Bless your heart you keep trying. We will work this out. Some of the bookshelves may need to go into the guestroom. See you tomorrow.

Thanks, Mae. I'll shoot you an email here in a minute. I really appreciate all your help.

Tis my pleasure indeed Quentin.

Here's a link to an example of some lights for the living room.

These are merely examples. The first one is good because you can mount it directly to the cieling, no need for the chain.

https://www.wayfair.com/lighting/pdp/winston-porter-weyer-5-light-shaded-empire-chandelier-wnsp5885.html

https://www.wayfair.com/lighting/pdp/alcott-hill-hambleden-5-light-shaded-classic-traditional-chandelier-alct4882.html

Thanks for the light fixture suggestions. Those look very versatile. I emailed you earlier; let me know if you got it.

It's so kind of you to help us very ordinary people with our very ordinary house. I know so many on here have large, stylish, and beautiful homes and a large budget to decorate. I know what we have isn't exciting, and the help really means a lot to us.

Quentin, what you have is wonderful in my opinion. I do not see you as ordinary at all but in fact execptioinal. You sing together, you read stories together and you focus on what is important, your family. And, no TV. Kudos to you. My husband and I are tied to our TV especially now with the COVID thing.

As for the light examples; you could keep the one you have in the living room just shorten the chain. Doing that will actually spread more light.

We finally got around to rearranging the furniture again. Here are some pictures! Thanks, @Mae Day Organizing and Interior Design

Here's the old living room now play/work/dining area.

Here's the play area. We realized after we finished that we should have moved around the rugs first.

Quentin, Thank you so much for the pictures! I did not see them until just now. The rooms look great! I see that you brought down the second red chair for the living room. And, put the bookshelf in the room too. That looks much better. Hopefully it works better for you and your family too. The two white chairs together in the front room looks like they work better for you and your family as well. Thank you again for the update.

Best Wishes to you and your family,

Marcie

Quentin, Each area looks and feels so much better! The colors of your furniture coupled together the way they are now creates a comfortable look and feel. I hope that it is as comfortable for you and your family as it looks and feels in the pictures.

Best Wishes,

MAE

Thanks, Marcie! Yes, this arrangement works well and really opens up the front room. We like it a lot. We ate dinner in the front room last night with friends and it worked out well (we still had enough room even though all our kitchen furniture was crammed in there too, sincee we were working on the kitchen floor).

I know it's been several years but I thought I'd come back and update with the arrangement we ultimately ended up with for the living room and dining room. We kept the two rooms switched for a while, but as we changed up furniture and added bookshelves we eventually went back to using the larger room as the living room/play room. As you can see we have managed to fit in a decent number of book shelves. The white chairs were pretty ratty after several children, so we replaced them with some chairs that we don't really like, but they were free and fairly small. We might put the leather ones down here but they're not very comfortable.

You can see there are still a lot of things we haven't gotten around to doing. We have more pictures to hang, Roman shades for the windows, and the play kitchen will be replaced with a slant top desk eventually (we made the basement into a playroom), but everything takes a while around here.
We never expected to be in this house this long but we couldn't have predicted the last few years, and here we still are five years later, making it work. :)

More pictures. I meant to post the ones with the new chairs.

We managed to squeeze in a lot of bookshelves.