Hi Beth - I'm new to this forum, but not new to coastal Southern Cal rose growing, so I'll chime in too. I'm in San Juan Capistrano on the South end of Orange County and about 2.5 miles from the beach in a coastal canyon. So I know all about roses in the marine layer fog. Mildew, not black spot, is the bane of our existence here. The only blackspot I've ever seen in my garden was on florist roses. But I do spray. And the three most fragrant ones on your list -- Double Delight, McCartney Rose and Fragrant Cloud -- will mildew even with religious spraying. But, the fragrance is worth it and I grow all three. No one has told you about the rose societies here yet. There are several. I go all the way south to the California Coastal Rose Society in Carlsbad. That's probably too far for you. There are two other OC rose societies -- the Orange County Rose Society which meets very near to Huntington Beach in Westminster -- they focus on exhibitions and hold their show the last weekend of October every year at Rogers Gardens. There's also another one that focuses mostly on gardening, garden tours and garden parties -- no exhibiting -- which is the Saddleback Rose Society -- that one's a bit inland for both of us. Wholly different climate those folks have. You can get to either one by googling the names, or I've put a link in here for the OCRS. On the rest of your list, I've grown most of them, and they do just fine. But as a general rule, in coastal cool areas like ours, fewer petals is better. Many roses just won't open like they do in hot climes, and sometimes you just die waiting for a leeeetle bit of heat to get them open, which never comes. So, plan to have some that open without heat. As for colors, try these -- Pink -- Our Lady Of Guadalupe is by far the best pink floribunda. But also check out The Imposter and Lovestruck, both of which do well for me. For Hybrid Teas, I like Memorial Day. Purple -- Intrigue is okay, but try Purple Tiger -- it's better and it's striped. It does really well on the coast. For a Hybrid Tea, I like Neptune and one that Armstrongs carries called Della Reese that is a darker purple hybrid tea with occasional exhibition form. Orange -- About Face Red -- I'm still looking for a good one. Yellow -- Julia Child or Midas Touch. Or even Peace, which gets enormous blooms on the coast. Multi -- get some stripes -- City of Carlsbad if you can find it or Cabana if you can't. Have fun. I seem to move every few years just BECAUSE I get to replenish my garden. Enjoy it. Kathy Here is a link that might be useful: Orange County Rose Society

Wow: your kitchen brings back memory. My previous kitchen was identical layout, except mine didn't have a hood. (I don't know how the previous owners lived here for 30years w/out a hood! The old cabinets were so GREASY!!) Do you have a layout of the 1st floor? What's past the peninsula? -- "Almost 4 years ago I gave up on the addition, double the size of the kitchen thought." Really? I was there, 4 years ago. --- Question: are your kids toddlers now, or are your kids older and you'll have toddler grandkids coming to visit? "I can survive a couple toddlers not burning themselves on the range " "I would love more than the 20" to the left of the range for prep" --- I ask this because these were 3 of the main reasons why I renovated my kitchen: - lack of hood - lack of prep/countertop - unsafe/not optimal use of the peninsula I am so happy that I DID change my layout, instead of just living with the same footprint/layout. -- Now I have a fantastic hood (sucks up toddlers w/ 1100CFM along with fried fish smell and all the steam from the induction cooktop when DH forgets how quickly his water boils when he walks away to get the tea bag). I also have tons of countertop space (23feet) to spread out: - DH gets his sandwich making area/baking area - I have my prep/cooking area, with no one walking through it - kids have the peninsula to hang out/do homework, without the risk of Mommy splashing hot oil or hot water or stir fry all over them/their craft paper, etc. Amanda's original layout Amanda's improved layout in 1st screenshot --- Now to be helpful: - hoods: My friend has a powerful Zepher. It worked great, but I'm not sure how easy it was to clean: spraying soapy water into the fans to clean??? I love my Kobe baffles that I can remove to soak/wash in the dishwasher. It sucks up so well; it's astounding just how much grease it catches. (Think about how much would be in my house if I didn't have this hood: ugh). --- countertop: - conflict: I like solid surface, but I had Corian in my previous kitchen and the integrated sink was great BUT it had tiny little dark cracks right around the drain, and it was constantly difficult to keep white. So while I love the integrated sink, I wouldn't want to deal with an unsightly sink. Formica: can you have an undermount sink? I can't stand an overmount sink for crud to catch at the rim. So of the 2 options, I would get solid surface, maybe with an undermount stainless steel or Silgranit (GW people love it) sink, instead of an integrated one. Good luck, Amanda

The comments about ten-power settings got me musing on the subject and about Amy's initial question about logarithmic power controls. Here's where that lead me. Nobody really has logarithmic power controls, but there can be power settings spaced to sort of approximate a logarithmic curve -- a number of settings at the low end with only a couple of additional points needed to define the steep side of the curve for really high heat. In theory, that can be done with a ten-step power curve and some folks do find 10 power settings fine for what and how they cook. Others do not. Is anybody else here old enough to remember the GE stoves and cooktops from 50's and 60's with ten mechanical pushbuttons for heat settings? Those pushbuttons were literally "digital" controls, meaning that you punched them with one of your digits. GE sold a lot of them for a couple of decades, so some people found them adequate. Some did not. For the current digital electronic ten-step controls, others here besides loonlakecamp have reported satisfaction with a ten step set-up. Others, like me, would find them inconvenient for my cooking with, say, my pressure cookers. With only ten heat level steps, I would have to be constantly switching settings to maintain the correct pressure. Power setting "1" might be too low, setting "2" might be too high. Switch to 1 for a while until the pressure drops a little too low, switch to 2 for a while until it gets a little too high, then back to 1, etc., etc. With in-between settings, I avoid that annoyance. You don't use pressure cookers? Then maybe having in-between steps won't matter to you. This is just one example of how cooking styles can differ and how more settings can matter to one cook and not to another. Much fuss is sometimes made about the supposedly infinite adjustablity of gas burners. As a practical matter, though, we mostly try to get the burner to the same relatively few settings. Searing is pretty much searing, isn't it? If you deep fat fry, how often would you care if if the oil were at 352° instead of 350°? But maybe somebody is working with sugar syrups where, say, it might matter if a syrup is at 325° and not 360° and then maybe it matters if the induction burner only has ten settings. That said, the subject of induction power settings and controls can be more complicated than just the number of settings. The need for finding "in-between" steps for induction cooking can reflect two different aspects of ways that manufacturers design induction burner controls. One consideration is the power cycling that all induction burners use for settings of less than full power. A technical term for this is "pulse width modulation. or "PWM." It is the same kind of thing a microwave does for low heat levels---momentary pulses of power that average out at a particular heat level. With most PICs as well as some brands of induction cooktops and ranges, the PWM is pretty crude. I've seen this somewhere described as firing up the burner for a second or two of omigosh hot and then switching totally off for three or four seconds. While these pulses average out at a certain heat level the timing can be problematic for, say, the srambled eggs that Amy mentioned at the outset. Combine that kind of "low frequency" PWM with the crude power controls found on many PICs, and you could have a reason that Amy would find herself wanting steps in-between power level "1" and "2" for scambling eggs. Some full size induction ranges and cooktops work this way. I noticed a lot of pulsing at the low heat settings on the Maytag induction range I saw demoed several years ago when I was stove shopping. From past threads on PWM, I gather than Whirlpool's induction ranges and cooktops (which include Maytag and Kitchenaid brands) have used crude PWM. For searching out past threads here on this subject try a search strings like "induction + pulsing + gardenweb" and "induction + cycling + gardenweb." A few of the expensive PICs (Cooktek, Garland, Vollrath) and many full size ranges and cooktops use much higher frequency PWM. Instead switching on and off for a second or more at time, the power switches on and off many times per second. The higher frequency of switching yields much finer power control that more closely approximates a steady heat level. The other design aspect that can lead to wanting "in-between" settings is in how the engineers program the electronic controllers to space the power settings on the appliance you are using --- that's the kind of logarithmic curve I thnk Amy may been thinking about when she posed her question in the original post. . For manufacturers, the least costly controls use simple linear spacing. Setting "1" would use the PWM to average 10% power, setting "2" would be 20%, etc. Even with a high quality PWM, though, 9 or 10 linear settings may be too crude, A thing most induction users discover pretty quickly is that they do most of their cooking in the low to medium range settings. The highest setting can be used for boiling. One or two medium high settings takes care of high heat applications like searing. There seem to be three strategies for induction manufacturers to address the crudeness. One is to add half-steps between the numbered power settings. The other is to program the stove's controllers to put more steps in the low to medium range and fewer in the high ranges. The third strategey combines the first two. Without using the particular induction stove or cooktop, it can be hard to find out whether the particular unit was designed to use one or the other or some combination of them. In my own somewhat limited experience, it seems that the GE induction appliances and Electrolux's Frigidaire/Kenmore ranges seemed to use a modified-half step approach with some concentration of steps but also using half steps for finer control. The Electrolux-branded models use a slightly different approach with quarter-steps at the lower power ends and fewer steps at the high end. Miele cooktops seem to use a similar kind of mix with the option of switching on more steps. I'm not sure how BSH (which includes Bosch) handles this except that their induction appliances manuals show that half-steps are available. The Samsung freeestanding induction ranges seemed to follow the GE model (19 half steps). The reports about Samsung's ten-step "Chef Collection" model seem to conflict, some seeming to say that stepping is linear, some hinting that the settings may be skewed to the lower end. There is a yet another strategy which is the near infinite stepping of of potentiometer-like controls. These control systems seem to be very expensive so, AFAIK, they are used only for the commercial Garland/Manitowiac PICS and maybe the new Miele induction range have this. I say "maybe" for the Miele because there is nothing about it in the product literature and the display shows only whole-number settings, but a couple of posters here -- livinginseattle is the name I recall -- have reported finding that the knobs can be turned to provide fine gradations of "in-between" settings. Some folks would find that ideal. Then the question becomes: how much are you willing to spend for the "ideal" (and are there other design compromises that have to accept in order to get that ideal function for the burners?)

How nice that your DH does such nice woodwork! . Kitchen layout - I have some concerns.... Aisles...It looks like you are measuring them correctly for the most part (counter edge-to-counter edge, not cabinet-to-cabinet) - with one notable exception - in front of the refrigerator. If the refrigerator is a counter-depth, be aware that it's depth will be around 31" plus an inch or so behind it for plug, water line, anti-tilt, etc. So, figure 32". That means it will stick out approx 6.5" past the counters. You show an aisle of 52.5" b/w the island an left wall; however, when you factor in the refrigerator, the aisle is only 46" in front of the refrigerator - and you have a seat there. That isn't wide enough. I would eliminate that one seat and give your self more useful work room on that island. (If the refrigerator is a standard depth, then you have even less space - subtract another 5" off the aisle.) . Ovens...You have your wall oven and MW in the middle of your seating area - I wouldn't want someone sitting there, especially if I was trying to use the wall oven. Opening it will send out a blast of heat, you will have to maneuver around someone sitting at the island to be able to put food in or take it out, and, finally, many of us have discovered that the best landing space for a wall oven is actually across from it - which you will not be able to use b/c there will be people and/or stools in the way of using the island as landing space. Do you have any landing space on the left side of the wall oven? I think it says "bookshelf" - so is that a full height bookshelf or just in an upper or base cabinet with counter b/w the cabinets? I'm not convinced the "catchall" counter will be available for use as oven landing space. Ditto, btw, concerning the MW, for the most part. . Island...if you plan to prep on the island, then the island is a major barrier island - it's b/w the refrigerator and the prep space on the opposite side of the island. If you plan to prep on the perimeter b/w the sink and cooktop, then the island is no longer a barrier. The prep sink, in that case, would be OK for a second person prepping (who would still have to deal with the barrier island) - just not for a primary prep area. I would then move the sink as MamaGoose suggests. The other issue with having your primary Prep Zone on the island is the DW - if the door is open while someone is loading or unloading, you won't be able to use a lot of the island for workspace. We have close to 47" b/w our peninsula and our sink wall and that's just enough to pass by an open DW door - but not enough to work opposite it - and you only have 1" more. Oh, and I'd add another 2 or 3 inches to the length of your island You need: 4 seats at 24" linear space each = 96" seats on the short end need 15" of clear leg/knee space as well = 15" 96" + 15" = 111" Your island is 109", only a couple of inches shorter. Will it matter? I don't know...are you a tall or large family? If so, then those couple of inches may very well make a difference. (You don't have to answer that here, just be honest with yourself privately.) I know there has been some discussion in the world of Kitchen Design about changing the guidelines to specify 30" per diner rather than 24"... Bottom Line: I would eliminate the seat in front of the refrigerator and add a couple of inches to the length (toward the FR end) of the island. If you eliminated that seat in front of the refrigerator, you could then get a 30"W x 24"D cabinet there (drawers, of course!) - a nice chunk of cabinet storage that's not broken up or too shallow. It would also then make it easier to access the refrigerator. Do you really need 6 seats? I would hope that when your entire family is present for a meal that you will be using the Dining Room - table seating is much more conducive to family bonding than counter seating (think of a diner with counter seats - they're great for strangers, but not so much for family!) Five seats should be plenty for snacks/quick meals, even when your boys have friends over. . Mudroom...Is it also your Laundry Room? Do you plan to put a door b/w the Laundry Room and the Mudroom to separate the rooms? Personally, I would not want everyone coming in via the Mudroom to see my dirty (or even clean) clothes! Separate rooms would be better. Better yet - can the Laundry Room be moved to wherever the bedrooms are? That's where most laundry comes from, so it makes sense to locate the washer & dryer where the clothes will be coming from/going back to. Does the Mudroom have a "Command/Message Center"? If not, consider one in your "wasted space" area. It would help keep the non-Kitchen clutter out of your Kitchen! Make the Garage/Mudroom door a sliding door (36" wide) Move the door down closer to the cabinets Put in a "Command/Message Center in the corner space you now have. Train/encourage everyone to drop their keys, phones, mail, etc., in the Command Center, not the Kitchen on that "catchall" counter! Note: I'd move both doors in the Mudroom down - they'd still match up and you can fit either cubbies or a closet on the "top" wall of the Mudroom. Is it wide enough? It depends, are you planning to put in a closet or cubbies? If cubbies, I would keep them shallow, no more than 18" deep b/c you need room to maneuver while taking off boots, shoes, etc. A closet will need to be 28" to 30" deep, including walls. There isn't enough room for a closet along the side walls. . Other comments.... Will there be enough room b/w the cooktop and cleanup sink for you to prep (since you said you like to spread out)? Because of the locations of the cooktop, refrigerator, and work side of the island, the most logical place for your Primary Prep Zone is the counterspace b/w the cleanup sink and the cooktop. You will gain more "floor space" and usable workspace if you make the corners 90-degree cutouts instead of diagonals. It will also open up the Kitchen space in general. Open shelves in your "Baking Zone" - with flour flying around, do you really want open shelves? If you are going to have open shelves near the cooktop, be sure you have very good venting - -- A hood at least 6" wider than the cooking surface and at least 24" deep -- A fan at least 600 to 900 cfms (more if you fry/stir fry a lot or grill inside) -- A hood that's vented to the outside -- A hood that is shaped so it adequately captures the grease, smoke, steam, fumes, odors, etc., since you won't have any cabinets flanking the hood to help corralling the grease, steam, etc.