

My mum commissioned this table just before I was born. Sheβd decided that a real family dining table was important to have before her first baby arrived, and all of my family dinners growing up were around it.
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Thereβs a block in the wood the carpenter didnβt quite match properly β I donβt think she loved that feature, but it was close to my βseatβ at the table, so it reminds me of dinners in Island Bay. Iβve never minded. If anything, itβs the first thing my eye finds β evidence that the table was made by a person.
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Every family dinner of my childhood happened here. Roast nights, homework debates, birthday cakes. I remember being told my gung gung had passed around that table.
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When [my partner] Jack and I moved into our first house, Mum gave it to us. I took a photograph of myself standing beside it while pregnant with Bobby, matching a photo Mum has of me in front of it, pregnant with me.
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Yumei
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