Thanks all! We love the house but I am really overwhelmed by how to furnish it. bronwynsmom -> We like ligheter airy look. I prefer modern clean lines and unfussy very curated look. Don't care for matchy matchy stuff. I think the room has a lot of texture already so I want to add some clean soft lines. I don't know if we need any drapery or naked windows are OK. We have nice deep sills on all the windows. The fireplace position changed during the build to where it is now (on the wall near the bench and a little higher). I like the picture you have painted about the dining table but flow wise it wouldn't work as the kitchen is closer to the opposite end with the smaller window and as it is so close, we were hoping to use that as our main dining area and avoid a table in the kitchen. We have a nice windowseat there that will just be for regular seating. Also the wiring is very complicated in the beams. There is already an electrical junction in the beam there for the chadelier. luckygal - We did not drop the ceiling.. The wood ceiling is original to the house in the living room, family room and the kitchen. What we did was raise the ceiling in the landing area and the rest of the bedrooms as there was space in the attic to do so. I had visited Frank Lloyd wright's taliesin west and loved the feeling of compression and expansion and we were lucky to be able to do so without too much effort. Piano --> Is it a requirement to have the piano on an inside wall? That might be a problem. Neither DH nor I play and our daughter has been learning for 2 years but only uses a keyboard to practice (while we are waiting for the house to be done). nancybee --> It looks very simple from the outside. I think of it as the earth house.. kind of nestled in the ground. to orient you, the window on the left of the front door is the big living room window. Mtnrdredux --> I agree about needing lighter furniture. We did try to open up the house by adding a lot of skylights but because of the shade from the trees, and the deep eaves in the back, it is still quite shaded. While I love arts and crafts, I think it will be too heavy looking for the house. We have a lot of wood in the living room..don't you think some upholstered pieces would be better? Maybe for the "cave/ family room, something arts and craftsy with a lot of pattern and color.

Thanks for sharing - enjoyed seeing the process in 'real life' as opposed to the book. Now- any ideas what to do w/35 6 1/2" blocks done like this? A lady gave me these blocks that she found at her aunt's house all done by hand, no idea how old they were. She doesn't want them back, just didn't want them to go to waste ---- lucky me:(?! I hate wasting them too, but... Seeing them made makes me want to make my own but 1st I'd like to get these old ones out of the way.

I have a UFO Cathedral Windows quilt started. I was flying by the seat of my pants and I'm using blocks a lot smaller than any sane person would on a large project. That's why it's a UFO. LOL. It's too large for a pillow now, and too small for a quilt. Just to wrap it up, I may work some more on it and make it a lap quilt, but to be very honest, they aren't all that soft and cozy for a lap quilt. No, they are not normally sandwiched. They're stunningly beautiful and are more for decorative effect than hard use. That's one reason they aren't sandwiched, but the primary reason is that they are so heavy and there is a tremenous amount of hand work on them to get the top done, and I haven't figured out how to gracefully sandwich one. No matter what I would do to stitch it to a backing with a batting would detract from the stitching.

Anele........I hear ya! We moved from CT to AZ. Wildly different architecture. We loved all the openness of the windows on the back of the house facing the backyard and the pool. So what did we do?? DUH we bought wood blinds and covered every window. Down the road we realized that due to the block walls, we could not see a blessed thing in any of the neighbors' yards/houses .....and they surely couldn't see us either. So we took down all the blinds except ones in bedroom where we needed them to block light. Expensive mistake but that's life. Sitting here now just relishing the unobstructed view of the swaying palms. Life is good!! Shutters are on windows on the front of the house facing our courtyard so that works well and they are very pretty. But I can see how that would not have worked for you.