My original post was probably half Rant and half call for suggestions for fruit trees that are well suited to the Suburban Yard. There is a local University Horticulture Professor (And peach researcher) here who has gone on record on the Radio that Homeowners shouldn't fool with stone fruit in our area.... One of his Key Messages is "Don't buy a peach tree at the grocery store!" But.. The grocery stores have a big pile of $14.99 Peaches and Apples sitting out front this spring... Destined to die a painful and horrible death in someone's back yard next year.. He has many *Excellent* points... related to the short attention spans, lack of knowledge and commitment of your "Average" Homeowners... They buy the tree without knowing anything about what to buy, stick it in a hole, then wait for the bounty to arrive... What they get is a sick tree and a big pile of wormy and rotten fruit.. Lets face it -- a Red Haven or an Elberta or an Indian Blood Cling grafted onto a Guardian rootstock would stack the deck in the home owner's favor here in SC... but good luck buying one at the Supermarket or local nursery... You would probably have to mail order it... Thanks John

Thanks again for all the feedback. LLass- You are amazing with your editing skills. I'm not able to edit the plan at all. Thanks for taking the time to do that!! You've given me some things to think about and I can see how the laundry and bath doors can be fixed. Thanks again!! Doodledog-Re master bath and bed -I thought switching them before but decided not to. We've had a similar layout in a previous house and it wasn't really an issue for us. We usually watch TV together, but we will put sound bats in. Mrs. Pete- I'm glad to see you agree with the the single sink. I agree, storage takes priority, how many times do I need to use the sink at the exact same time as my husband? The safe room is only a little over 8x4, so for a family of 4 and 2 (big) dogs that's really not too large.Unfortunately, living in the South a storm shelter of some kind is needed. I'll see what I can tweak with the master closet and bath. My husband works from home so his daily work clothes are shorts/jeans and t-shirts. He does travel and needs suits ect. but we have been trying to simplify our wardrobe, so I really don't want a lot of space. I would just fill it up. :) I didn't have it penciled in the plan, but there will be a closet upstairs in the guest room as well as in his office. I will mock up the dining room to check the space. Bird lover 6- I'm glad you understand where I'm coming from with the western sun! I don't want to be fighting a constant battle to be comfortable. Thanks again everyone for all your comments!! I really appreciate you taking the time to help me out.

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About the house plan: - It's a lovely exterior. Just my style! - If family gatherings are a priority for you, I think you'd want a larger dining room. 13x13 won't hold a very large table. - Still on the subject of dining, do you really need a breakfast table AND island seating in two separate places? - U shaped kitchen don't particularly work well with islands in this configuration; they "trap people" in the U. - I would not place a desk in that spot in the kitchen. Imagine someone's sitting at the desk ... his chair will block the path into the kitchen, annoying everyone else in the family -- plus you have an office just around the corner. What I think you might actually want in the kitchen -- I'd want it a bit more out of sight /towards the entry -- is more of a family control center: A designated place for a calendar and kids' sports and school schedules, a place to stick the tickets to next week's Halloween carnival to a bulletin board, a shelf where phones can sit to charge, a place for sunglasses and car keys. And I want NONE of that in my kitchen. - Do you barbeque often? I'd want a more direct door to the backyard. As it is, you'll have to carry platters of meat around the peninsula, past the breakfast room table, and into the great room to reach the porch ... then you'd have to turn right and navigate the porch furniture to get to the steps on the far end. - Covered porches are wonderful (I have one on my current house and plan one for my next house too!), but 8' isn't wide enough for a porch that'll really be used (though 6', even 5', is enough for a show-only porch, as I suspect your front porch will be). My covered porch is 12' wide x 30' long, and it's perfect: We have the grilling area on one end, a table in the middle, and seating on the far end ... and we can walk straight to the steps without furniture being in the way. - I do not like bay windows under covered porches, but that's personal preference. - Speaking of porches, why do you have a set of steps on the far left of the front porch? It's not near the garage /driveway. - The laundry room is far from ALL the bedrooms. Note that to put away clean clothes in your master closet, you'll have to carry those baskets about 60' (half the length of a football field) and through four doors. Most people on this board seem to prefer the laundry near the bedrooms since that's where people change clothes, and keeping the rooms near one another = fewer steps. If you anticipate a large family, I'd consider a second laundry upstairs; it wouldn't be out of sync with a house this size. I would suggest a laundry chute from the upstairs bath, but the clothes would land in the great room! - I'd flip the washer/dryer to the opposite side of the laundry room. This will allow you to keep water in only ONE wall (and with the refrigerator on that wall, you're probably going to want water for an ice maker). - With the kids' bathroom upstairs, the downstairs powder room will see heavy use. This super-narrow set-up is not comfortable -- remember, you're going to use this room for potty training, which means you'll sit in there for long stretches at a time ... and that door is set up in such a way that you'll have to be in the room with the door closed so you can watch the child ... I guess you'll be sitting on the sink. I'd make this area into a large reach-in pantry and carve out a more comfortable powder room using some of the laundry room space OR some of that storage in the garage. - Since you anticipate a large family, I'd add some organizing items in the garage entryway. The size is already plentiful, but a bench where kids can sit while you put their shoes on /coat hooks /places for bookbags, etc. would be useful. In this same area, I'd add a door to close off the kitchen ... in a house of this size /expense, I wouldn't expect to see the garage door from the living area. - At 24x24, the garage is a rather ideal size. That's a large storage area in the garage -- do you need it, or will it just collect junk? Keep in mind that you have significant storage upstairs over the garage too. - The family room is plenty deep, but it's only 15' wide ... and about 3' of that must be used for walkway, so you actually only have 12' of space for furniture. This doesn't seem to be in keeping with the rest of the house. - How do you plan to use the office /homeschooling room? I'd add a second door into this room over near the master bedroom entrance, and I'd use real doors on both. The rest of the house is open; I'd want this room to have both visual and acoustical privacy. - I'd decrease the master bedroom width. 19' is very wide, even with a king bed, yet you don't have the right set-up for a seating area on one end. The windows in the master bedroom are very nice. - The master bath could be so much nicer! It's an odd shape: as you walk in, the around-the-corner part won't be visible, odd. Consider, too, the pathway necessary to reach the toilet: Through two doors and around a corner. The shower looks small; I think I'd make the current toilet-closet into a shower -- a shower gets daily use, and a large one is a nice luxury. The master closet isn't particularly spacious -- I might use some of that excess bedroom space to enlarge this. - Upstairs, the three bedrooms and bathroom look good, and all that linen storage will be great for kids' sleeping bags, etc. ... but why do you need a rec room AND a family room?