So I was in Wal Mart a month or so ago
Which is exactly where you would expect a fantasy to begin right? The fantasy of being the sort of person who does not shop in Wal Mart. But I am that sort of person, just sometimes I get these ideas in my head and I forget just whose life I am leading. I call them my Martha Stewart moments.
I needed table linens. Actually I needed table plastics. The dog had somehow snagged a claw in the last decent looking wipe off table cloth (ok, vinyl) we owned and ripped it. My table’s surface is…unattractive.. It’s the table from DH’ family kitchen & was low end balsa, later covered with fake wood look stick on plastic. It needs covering.
Off I went to Wal Mart, the source of my previous table vinyls, to purchase some new ones and some plastic placemats & to see if my one time buy of 8 white cotton napkins could be repeated. (I saw them once on sale for $5 and have never seen them again)
Table vinyls were only available in bright aqua. My kitchen is very earth toned, grey slate, medium wood, green trim. I looked at the table cloths (made of actual cloth) and got this wild idea that “I could do that. Just throw it in the wash from time to time. Get cloth placemats too. How dirty can they get?”
Because I’d forgotten I had 2 messy eater children and the cat problem wasn’t even in my head to be forgotten.
I ended up going to Target, JC Pennys and Kohls before I found placemats, napkins and table cloths that I like the look of and at a price point I could live with. I brought my booty home and set the table. 
Ah, see I can be the person with cloth!
But then we had dinner.
And most of those things had to be washed because there were mashed potatoes and ketchup ground in on half the table. Then it happened again a couple nights later. I have 2 sets of table linen that I alternate between but I just wasn’t too happy with the constant laundry of all this.
Then I noticed this
Thank you for the comfy bed
And this
And this 
They never laid on the table vinyl.
I can’t be in the kitchen constantly shooing them off the table & the table is the first thing you see when you come to the door, so it has to stay covered. And I am already washing the things more than I thought possible.
So I suppose I am not the sort of person who can do actual table linens
Maybe I can get some table vinyl and put it over the table cloth for mealtimes?
