put your far left middle sf by other sf on right side,put snap peas in front of far left sf ,swapplaces with zucchini n potatoes,reason being peas can climb sunflower as a trelis and zucchini is a vining plant so it can sprawl over corner of box on ground,one thought is how deep is your box for potatoes wiill it work in that shallow of a box?need 8-10 inches of soil for potatoes make back row north side,just a thought have fun

The posted image is a bit small for me to see any details on. But if others are also having problems viewing the image, I found that if I clicked on the image it would open up in a new tab and then I could click "CTRL +++" and get a much larger (albeit somewhat fuzzy) image to study. At least this works if you using Firefox as your browser and are on a PC. Not being a computer nerd, I don't know if it will work if you use a different browser or are on a MAC. Okay - on to comments.... First of all, I would caution you to be aware of the fact that the more complex the exterior of your home is (i.e., the more corners it has) the more it will cost per square foot to build it. I'm not saying that you should plan on building a simple rectangle - just that you should be aware that "corners" cost extra money because they result in more complex roofs and foundations, and require more framing and more exterior materials per sq ft of interior space. Therefore, IMHO, once you get away from simple rectangles, extra corners should always serve a purpose. Probably the best reason for designing a house with extra corners is so that more rooms can be corner rooms that have windows on two sides. Christopher Alexander, one of the most influential architects of modern times, writes in A Pattern Language, "When they have a choice, people will always gravitate to those rooms which have light on two sides, and leave the rooms which are lit only from one side unused and empty." I hate to say it but you don't seem to be taking very good advantage of the corners in your complex design. At the front of the house, in one corner you've stuck a big closet. Whenever possible, closets should not be on exterior walls and, definitely they should not take up valuable corners. The laundry room takes up another front corner. While a laundry room with light from two sides would be lovely, but in your design the corner jog is cut short by the staircase so one wall of the laundry is probably too short for a window. And, if you put a window in the front wall of the laundry, it will look out of balance on the front facade unless you put a matching window in the closet which is likely to result in faded garments. My suspicion is that you were not planning to put a window in the laundry at all. Then, at the front left, you have an office which really could have light from two sides - but you're only showing windows at the front. Behind the office, you have an apparently-windowless, small powderroom taking up yet another corner. Then in the very back left hand corner of the house is the Great Room which would certainly benefit from getting light from two directions. But the left hand wall of the great room is taken up with built-in bookcases. I'm going to attach a link below to a section from A Pattern Language about window light and also urge you to go to Houzz.com and click thru and find inspiration pictures of rooms that just seem to draw you in as places you would WANT to live. Then notice how many of these images very obviously show rooms that are getting natural light from two directions. (Even if you can't see windows on two walls in the pictures, you can tell if a room is lit from two directions by the studying the shadows.) Okay, enough about windows and light! I can't quite read any of the dimension markings on your plans but guess-timating based on the depths of countertops and widths of doorways and things like that, it looks like you're making reasonable decisions about room sizes, hallway widths, closet sizes, and the space that the stairways will take up. That's good. A lot of people sketch aisles and hallways too narrow or don't leave enough room in front of toilets to stand and think they can have walk in closets that are 4ft x 12ft. Avoiding those kinds of things is a good start. I like that your garage is set back from the main portion of the house. That should help to keep the garage from overwhelming the front elevation. Typically, I don't like front- facing garage doors but with two tandem bays and a lot only 100 feet wide, you may not have other options...especially if you're planning on parking something like a motor home in the garage. I DO NOT like the additional three steps up from the mudroom to the main part of the house! To me, steps at that point are just an extra obstacle to maneuver when entering the house with arms loaded with groceries. If the idea is to separate the mud room from the rest of the house, I would much rather see a door that could be shut when needed and left open the rest of the time than steps that must always be dealt with. If you should ever find yourself in a wheelchair or even on crutches, having several steps at all entrances to your home will make your life miserable. Speaking of which, given the size of your planned home and the fact that all bedrooms will be on the second floor, have you considered installing a home elevator or at least making provisions for the later installation of one? I know you're young but if you live in the house long enough, you eventually won't be! And, if/when you decide to sell it, having an elevator would make your home marketable to older people with bad knees like me. I love the great big pantry but don't like that, in order to reach the pantry when coming in from the garage, one must go thru the mudroom, up those additional three steps, and then clear thru the kitchen to the dining nook and make another right turn. I'd want my pantry to be located close to the garage so I wouldn't have to carry heavy bags of groceries all that distance. Any chance of maybe moving that staircase that is between the pantry and mudroom (and that I assume goes down to a basement) to the other side of the pantry? That would allow you to have a door between mudroom and pantry making grocery unloading a whole lot easier. I understand the extra doorway that goes from mudroom directly outdoors. But instead of two doors exiting the mudroom - one to garage and one directly outside, have you considered having a man-door to the left of the two front garage doors? Then, if you wanted to go outside via the mudroom, you could just pass thru the garage without having to open a garage bay door. Getting rid of the extra door in the mudroom would give you more room in the mudroom for cubbies. You said you already had a kitchen/Great Room similar to this plan so possibly having your kitchen messes totally on view to everyone in the Great Room is not a problem for you. While open plans are extremely popular, I personally prefer to have my sink and the working kitchen countertops at least a little bit hidden from the GreatRoom and dining areas. When I have guests over for dinner, I don't want someone to have to LOOK at the dirty pots and pans still sitting on the stove or soaking in the sink when we sit down to eat. IMHO, Looking at all of the clean-up that will need to be done as soon as dinner is over would tend to destroy the festive mood of dinner. So the only way I would go for a totally open plan would be for it to have an island or peninsula with a raised bar to at least sort of hide my cooking messes. I would NOT want a cooktop on a single level island. PITA to properly vent and spattering grease could hit someone seated on the other side of the island. I'm not a huge stickler for symmetry but I do like "balance" and the off-centeredness your the Great Room fireplace kind of bothers me. I suspect that it would be a MAJOR turn-off to anyone to whom symmetry is important. If you don't want the fireplace centered, I think it would look better to go with a corner fireplace. You could then put bookshelves along the wall shared with the office out to the edge of the foyer and an equal distance along the left hand wall. You could then square up the far back left hand corner and stick in a window or two. (Oops, I'm back to talking about light - so obviously it's time for me to quit.) Looking forward to watching your design develop. Here is a link that might be useful: A Pattern Language, Pattern 159

wow....a lot of reading for the mind and soul during insomnia. So many ideas and so many things to think of..... This post just reiterates more that we are all products of our "families" and our experiences. The bad comes with the good and we grow and we hope to make the best of it and for some....I suppose the main goal is to not repeat some things that have damaged us the most. Brings us to the OP and the reason for custom homes. We all have a dream of the way we want to live and how we want our dream home to be a part of that life. I understand that most downsize to below a 2000 sq ft ranch. That doesn't mean it has to be done that way. I'm not trying to sound ridiculous or anything, but is it more a modern thing for people to down size or is it regional? It seems I know very few who have done this. My Grandparents just closed off their cellar and upstairs and lived in the main-level. They made adjustments when needed to the bathroom. I suppose it must be more modern as farmers used to stay in there homes and their family would move in and care for them. Nowadays I know a lot of farmers who give the "home place" to their youngest and then build a new "retirement" place for themselves. Just wondering?!?! Anyway....I'm from rural, farm country and where most have large families and super extended families. Most of my friends and family were raised in ranch homes or simple 2 story homes. Average sq ft being 1800-2100, often with a semi-finished rec room in the basement. The trend with my parents, their friends and our family is that they usually stay in the home until they pass away or a few go into a nursing home. I can honestly say that all 10 Aunts/Uncles and many family friends have added onto their homes in their 50's or early 60's. Actually 1 moved instead:). They all wanted a larger "gathering" room and built on for that reason. Many (prior to building on) used the lower-level rec room for this and then just for reason of stairs, location to kitchen and bathrooms, aesthetic, etc had added on to accommodate. So, they were all adding onto their homes, when I suppose many would think they were getting closer to downsizing. They all now approaching mid 70's and some into their 80's and are still in their added on homes. We have just found over the years that when a hall or other place is rented out for a holiday, etc....our family loses it's closeness. All the cousins arrive, eat and leave. We have found it more inviting, relaxing, etc to have it in the home where we can hang, relax and gather for hours. So, if you don't want people for hours, rent a place with tables and folded chairs or go to a restaurant :-) My parents actually were the ones who built a new place 2 years ago. They had owned acreage/wooded for years. They originally built a cabin on it and found themselves spending so much time there, they decided to build. Oh, we were so against the idea, everyone was! Too far out, too far from hospitals, too much land, too much too much. My dad said everyone thinks we are crazy, but it is what WE WANT, do you think we really haven't thought about all these things.....we will sell and move again if and when it becomes too much. So, they did what they wanted and they are thrilled. It is a smallish ranch with an open floor plan and a guest bedroom for occasional grand kids sleep overs. However, they have a large family room that is very cozy most of the time. They have the furniture placed in a groupings with large walk-ways all around. For Christmas it takes 2 people to move their one couch to open the room up and make room for all. And there solution to host really large parties was a "finished garage." They finished the walls with drywall and had breadboard added all around below the chair rail. They added cabinets and a counter top with electrical (crockpots etc) and a refrigerator. They have ceiling fans, highly insulated, and a nice epoxy (???) floor. They have a half bath directly inside the house from the garage. It is party ready just by backing the cars out. Of course they have an out building for all the junk that most people would have in their garage. What they didn't know is that it is the younger grandchildrens favorite place. It works out lovey when the young ones are out there....we pull out some old cars and trucks and they go crazy and then the adults can converse and hear each other. So, just to mention a few ways that many others have actually added to their homes in order to manage growing families. Personally, in our new build....we added on a huge dining room with surrounding wrap around covered porch and hope to be able to entertain large numbers in this space for many years. OP...I do wish you the best with your new home and your family is lucky to have you and a wonderful place to spend with you!

OK, using your black & white floor plan, any reason you couldn't turn the stairs 90 degrees, so that you would go up or down from the left side? Very roughly, since I don't have time to figure out the numbers, then move the stairs towards the front door so that the (open) wall of the up stairs hits where the non-hinge side of the door to the MBR is (get rid of that door). Put a coat/storage closet to the right of the front door to provide a buffer between this new foyer and the MBR wall. This will create a very nice place for people to enter, a place to put raincoats, and their first view as they enter will be to your great view to the west through the great room instead of the kitchen, which is now blocked off for the most part and which can be pulled back to the right partly into where the stairs were. You have plenty of space on that left side to create 3 spaces: With both kids and guests, it is very nice to have a room that can be a little apart from the main goings on. In that back left corner where you have the DR, wall it off with double pocket doors facing the front to make it a den, TV room, playroom, whatever--it's use would change over the years. The middle of that 40' space can be the DR, with plenty of space left in the left front corner for the great room. Now put the MBR entrance coming in from the top left side of the room, with the WIC closet door on the top right side of the BR (not ideal to go around the bed to the bath/closet--maybe someone else can work this out better), & the bed can go between these on the long wall, which uses the space better than if it's on the short wall. You have enough room behind all of this if you get rid of the excess space in the WIC & master bath to have a separate laundry (most people seem to strongly prefer this), the powder room, and mudroom. I'd move the door separating the kitchen & pantries to the right side of the pantries--if this part of the plan still keeps this form. Anne