Design Conundrum

I'm having a design issue with an area in our house, and I need help!  Hello, there, internet!  Come to my aid!  Give me advice!   Bring me inspiration!

Early this summer, we had a massive garage sale with my parents.  One of the things we got rid of was our breakfast table, which we bought long ago, within the first week we moved to Boston.  When we bought it, we were living in Harvard Square and had no car, and for those of you who are familiar with Cambridge, you will appreciate that Nathan carried that heavy table all the way from Central Square to our apartment in Harvard Square in order to get it home.  Now, this table was perfect for our life in Boston.  It was round, 42" across, and we bought two chairs with wicker seats to go with it.  Two sides of the table folded down so that we could set it against a wall with no wasted space.  In our first tiny apartment, the table served as a kitchen/dining table, and in our second, roomier apartment, it had a cheerful little place near the windows in our kitchen.

In our new house in Houston, this table still fit.  Our breakfast area is fairly small, and even a 42" table with chairs fills it up (the standard size is 48").  But by the time we sold this piece, it had seen better days.  The leaves which folded down were sagging and no longer sat flat when we had them propped up, which we now needed to do to maximize the eating space.  This meant that with all the wiggling at our table at dinnertime, Jane's soup sometimes ended up on the floor.  And the other reason it wasn't really working for us anymore was because it only had two matching chairs, and there are now five of us.  Plus, the seats of the chairs were wicker, and although that's not the worst thing--fabric would be much worse--kids' food did get stuck in there regularly.

So I've been searching for a replacement table and chairs for our breakfast area, to no avail.  Here are my criteria: I want a table that is 42-45" across, because I think 48" is just not going to leave enough room for chairs to back in and out.  I need it to be a pedestal table so that we can fit more than four chairs around it without bumping into table legs.  And I do not want leaves that fold down, because eventually I would have the soup-falling-on-the-floor problem again.  I also don't want to spend a bunch of money on this table, but I don't want it to be a piece of junk, either.  And my last qualification is that I would really like chairs with wooden seats.

So here's my Conundrum Number One: can five or six chairs even fit around a 42-45" table?  Has anyone tried that?  I'm even wondering if we can all eat at a 42" table--we were squeezed pretty tightly before, and there were only four of us.

Conundrum Number Two: If I cannot find the right round table and chairs in my price range, would a rectangular table work in my space?  I haven't figured that out yet.  The area is quite small, and you need to be able to walk around it to get to the laundry room and back door.

Conundrum Number Three: Other than Craig's List, where can I find an inexpensive set?  I have scoured Craig's List for months to no avail.  I've also looked at Target, Joss & Main, Pier 1, and several other places.  I like this table a lot, but I can't convince myself that it's a good idea to spend that much (plus chairs), since we have a lot of other projects around the house that we need to do.

Help, friends!  Do you have any thoughts?