@Patricia Colwell Consulting—Our house sits on a street that leads to the park, and there's a constant flow of people passing by. The archway provides a direct view into the second-level den, where kids often spend time. Before jumping to conclusions, it's helpful to ask questions for clarity.

"There is no such thing as a bossy, traditionally inspired contractor. There is ONLY a technician who follows the design details provided by the designer, the homeowner or whomever is in charge of the project."

This has got to be one of the most arrogant and misguided posts I've ever seen on Houzz. Contractors are not animatronic zombie drones to be programmed by air-conditioned pocket protected desk jockeys. Drawings and specifications are not carved in stone, but malleable and should be viewed as very strong suggestions as to what we are collectively trying to accomplish.

I've had a 50-year career in construction and have saved many an architect/designer/homeowner from poor and sometimes dangerous designs and themselves. Good contractors are like the goalies in hockey. We're the last line of defense before something really bad happens. Ignore us at your own peril.

If someone asked me if they should buy a BMW or a Lexus, I wouldn’t insist that they get a bicycle.

It depends the depth you make the drawers? It depends if you have a pantry for super sized pots and other bulky like a huge roasting pan?

It depends how you cook and what you cook and how often. It depends a lot of things.

But to say that a deep drawer is inconvenient?

Make them as you like...

@aem04 The reason to take it up to the ceiling is that it elongates the space, makes your ceilings look higher, and cleaning a wall above a vent hood is not fun, but cleaning tile is relatively easy.

As long as you at least go to 2 you should be fine. Good luck!

Alternate less expensive suggestion.

Interview a few local architects in that mix. They may be more educated and experienced in the issues you have.

Read the rules and abide by them. The last thing anyone wants in their neighborhood is someone who builds a home cheaply that brings down the whole neighborhood. An attorney can help, and you can ask the new neighbers what they think about your ideas. Is there a review committee?

Two neighbors in my very, very small town put up sheds. One neighbor knocked it out of the park and built a shed that looked exactly like this house, with stone siding and nice windows. Another neighbor bought one of those sheds you see outside at Home Depot. The neighbor next door to the Home Depot shed neighbor had a fit (he may have the start of dementia) and made a giant deal out of the Home Depot shed. This neighbor had the money to sue if he wanted. It was all smoothed out by hiding the Home Depot shed and painting it a different color to blend into the background. Nonetheless, the Home Depot shed neighbor lost a lot of sleep and was the topic of unwanted notice for a while in front of our town council.

Do the right thing, not the cheap thing. Don't be that guy. Buy another lot somewhere else if you don't want to abide by the rules. Whether or not someone sues you over your crappy looking pole barn will depend on how wealthy they are and how bad it looks. But it will not look good.

Where do the CC&R's come from? Are they lawful or rumors?

You have a ranch house. It doesn't have any details leaning to MDM.

I think the kitchen could benefit from the details offered by the Shake-style cabinets.

There are some nice variations of the Shaker style.

Different items have to be serviced in your backyard. If you don't want poured concrete then do stepping stones or pavers.

I find it sad that people on here have to “brag” that they only run the dishwasher every other day or twice a week. Stop telling people what you can afford and imply that anything over your budget is wasteful. I suggested two dishwashers to my daughter when they were building in 2004. My son-in-law thought it was a waste until the first week they were in their house. My daughter loves, loves to cook and bake and they have a system for using both dishwashers. For the record, I only had room for one dishwasher and sometimes run ours twice a day. My husband loves to find new recipes-and it seems they require every dish, pot, pan in our kitchen! We both wish we had space for a second one. To the OP-sink in the middle of the two dishwashers and the trash to the left of the left one. Enjoy!

We have 2 DWs flanking the clean-up sink for our family of 4 and we love, love, love it. It really makes life easier. There are so many different scenarios where I think about how happy I am to have that second empty DW, ready to be loaded. We have our trash on the island, next to the prep sink. I planned to put a small trash under the clean-up sink for scraping into, but my husband persuaded me to wait and we have found the island trash is fine. We are the type to empty a DW as soon as it is done, so there is always an empty DW waiting for that item that is too large for the half-full DW and there is no more running a half-full DW so you can empty it in anticipation of a large amount of dirty dishes. I now put our pots and pans in the DW (better for the environment) instead of handwashing them to save room in the DW. We never have dirty dishes in the sink awaiting the end of the DW cycle. If the middle and lower racks fill at different rates, no big deal — overflow goes into the empty one. As soon as a DW cycle is started, I move the black leather tassel that means “load this one” to the other DW. Also, I doubt anyone with two DWs has ever thought of it as a flex or status symbol. I think it often cheaper than 24” of cabinetry.