The Dining rooms

…seat about 80 people and include a lot of personal touches. The oak floors were installed by Paul’s brother-in-law, Mark.. The birch-top tables were constructed by Paul’s brother’s father-in-law. The eight-foot Prairie Style hinged windows were designed by Kevin, our architect and friend, and stained and assembled by Paul’s brother, Tom. The paintings on the wall were gifted to us, on consignment, by the mother of our friend and part-time host, Bruce Mitchell. Bruce is a retired high school English teacher from Evanston. He’s the only one at the Moon who you’ll find in a tie (old habits die hard). His mother, now in her nineties, is an artist who has studied and shown her work all over the world, including little places like the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Her work is full of color and adds great character to the smaller of the two rooms. The larger of the two rooms is decorated with festival posters from around the country. Every month at Prairie Moon we celebrate a festival that is occurring somewhere in the United States at the same time. We’ve had the Kodiak Crab Festival, the Miami Mango Festival and the Klamath River Salmon Festival, just to name a few. And the California Crush, a celebration of the West Coast wine and produce harvest, comes up in September. We feature food, wine and drink specials based on the region and season represented by the festival. Invariably, some of these new creations end up on our regular menu. In this way, there is always something new happening at Prairie Moon. We get to hang the posters, too!

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