Create A Family Friendly Fall Tablescape

*This post contains affiliate links.  All opinions are my own.  By clicking on said links, I may earn a few pennies to go toward my kids college fund….I’ve got a ways to go.

I am super excited to participate in a very fun bloghop tour powered by Hometalk.com along with some really amazing bloggers!  The theme?

I am featuring my Family Friendly Fall Tablescape for this blog hop party.  Make sure to check out the bottom of the post where you can find other bloggers links!

I love flipping though home magazines, seeing those fabulous dining room centerpieces give me a burlap sack full of envy.  You see, I have four kids.  Three of them boys.  You know what that means.  Trucks driving across every surface, play dough smashed into the cracks of my table.   And the girl?  Oh, she thinks everything is so pretty and feels the need to touch and play with it all.  I will be the first to admit that I do not have a perfect home.  I mean, sure, I really try hard to , but it just isn’t reality.  A few months back I wrote a post about how I wish you could see what was going on just outside any of my pictures.  I can guarantee there are children wrestling, sneaking chairs over to the cabinets to try and steal a tasty treat.   A pile of laundry?  Without a doubt.

So the thought of decorating my dining table is so tempting.  No really, I love to create stylish and elaborate centerpieces.  What I don’t love?  Catching my 3 year old sitting on said table breaking my glass lantern.  It makes mom sad, and just a slightly bit mad.  I decided I needed to focus on creating a tablescape that was child friendly yet still stylish and elegant.  My tablescape started with one huge important part.  Butcher paper.  I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner.   If you’ve ready any of my posts, you have seen that I love me some butcher paper.  You can see how I created a butcher paper wall holder here.

I usually like to have a table runner draping my table.  I will tell you this.  It makes me cringe when my kids want to eat their spaghetti on said table runner.  If they get a little spaghetti on my butcher paper runner, well, I can throw it away or reuse it as a fun place for my kids to draw and I can create another.  I decided to use my Chalk Markers to add some fall artwork to the paper.  You could use sharpie markers too, and even regular chalk.  Little secret.  If you use regular chalk on the butcher paper, spray it with hairspray (I prefer Aquanet) and it will stay put.

The advantage to this table runner?  What a fun idea to let your kids create the artwork!  I added names to the paper to indicate where people will be sitting for dinner.  What about writing some sweet messages to each other.  You are only as limited as your imagination here.

Now, I cannot create a fall centerpiece without my antique dough bowl.  I bought mine from Painted Fox Treasures.  They have some amazing products!  They are always offering discounts too!

I filled my dough bowl with pumpkins form my garden(painted white of course), faux willows, and some white faux flowers.  All these items are so earthy and lovely,and guess what?  My kids can’t break these like they can my glass ones.  I dotted the table with handmade sweater and burlap pumpkins, which I will be doing a tutorial on later this week.

The other day I was tumbling through my attic when I stumbled upon a giant bag of old sweaters.  I don’t even remember putting them up there!  Do not worry. They are being put to good use.

Over the years we have lost or broken all our glass drinking cups.  We are a strictly plastic cup family now.  This is when I pull out my bottling glasses.  Have you ever dropped one of these on the floor?  They can take a pretty good beating, so I am a huge fan of using these.  I think they also give a nice farmhouse vibe.

I just inherited 2 large boxes of bottles from my grandma!  Let me clarify, she is still alive.  Just cleaning house I guess.  Not much bottling in your mid-90s I guess.  I found some gold in those boxes by way of a few 2 quart jars.  These are harder to come by, and are oh so awesome to use as a vase for flowers.  I used mine to hold some rabbit brush from my backyard.  It is the perfect weed for fall:)

For my plating, I snatched up some of those plastic silver chargers I found at a thrift store.  I spray painted them with a rubbed bronze color.  Soon, I might have some even better chargers(I just have to talk my hubby into it…..stay tuned for my Christmas tablescape).  I rolled up my napkins I bought at World Market with some twine and added a little more rabbit brush as an accent.

As you can see, I am really digging the neutral pallet.  It is oh so dreamy.  I am loving my fall tablescape.  The best part, so are my kids!  They feel comfortable sitting here and enjoy looking at all the fun items.  I love it because I don’t have to police them when they are sitting here.  My quest for a family friendly with a stylish space is really coming along!  I hope you’ll stop by again to see what else I have up my sleeve and make sure to check out some of these awesome posts linked up below!  One more thing!  Check out posts  with the hashtag #homeforfall on hometalk.com and other social media to see some amazing fall inspiration!

I’ll do a happy dance if you follow me on social media!

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