My dining room table seats 10 and can fit 12 in a pinch. When not in use, there are 8 chairs around it. Knowing I'd squeeze 12 people in there on occasion, I got 12 matching chairs (windsor chairs with wide backs). I'd be much happier if I had gotten a bench or something with a much smaller back for the extra chairs. The backs of the chairs are practically locked together when I have a full house. Really, I wish I had just gotten a couple of saddle chairs (no back at all). This would work especially well for me, since at least a few of my guests are usually children. Anyway, this is a long winded way of seconding the parsons chair idea or bench idea!

As I said, the window's a retrofit. Only a few years old. The 'sill' is on the inside, forgive my terminology if it confuses. It fills the area from the edge of the vinyl part, near the outside, to the inside part of the house where the trim is attached. I'm fairly certain the warping is from humidity, or incorrectly applied spray foam (or too much fibreglass insulation inserted too firmly.) Another window, presumably installed at the same time, had NO insulation or caulking of any sort between the framing and the window so who knows what's going on.(I updated the trim on the other window, I haven't gotten to that in this bathroom.) I guess I need to remove that trim.

Jon, the table will be a covered patio and will end up having my small garden tools, gloves, seeds and stuff like that on it so I think I will just go ahead and sand, stain, varnish, and pretend the curves add to the charm. :-) Thanks again to you both. It saved us a lot of time and trouble trying to straighten it.

Would your table top in the nook be of a size that you could use an old enamel top in good condition? That'd be pretty nifty. I had researched Waaayyyyy back when I started this kitchen planning and I contacted IPE to see if they could make an enamel top for a peninsula...they do a lot of the old chambers stove panels for people on another forum and as I remember, folks over there were happy with the finished product. Anyway here is the operative line from his email response to my inquiry: "We have made counter tops out of 16 gauge enameling steel and porcelain enameled them. The biggest piece we could do would be 3' W x 8' L." Not sure about the decorative stuff but it might be worth asking.... Here is a link that might be useful: IPE