Thanks everyone! Jillius I love the closet pantry! Thank you for taking the time for additional options. I have thought long and hard about the layout and different options. Here is where we are after speaking with my hubby: 1) We would like to keep the sink where it is and have a nice focal point with the wall hood. We are doing a similar panel treatment to our fireplace and will carry this design into kitchen. This area will be bumped out a bit. We want to keep the sink view. It's the only real view we have of our side yard, rose garden (when they are alive and blooming), pool with the sound of trickling water and a place to see the kids if they are swimming out back. We have plantation shutters and sectional in living room so no unobtructed view like we have in the kitchen. Also, the back wall away from anything else is ideal spot to cook for us. We don't want gaps in the wall cabinets to add more windows on the back wall next to cooktop. We have 9 ft ceilings and the space isn't as closed in and dark as it appears in the pictures I snapped at night with my phone. We do not want a bulky fridge in the path near our patio door. Need some free space just to maneuver in and out of patio door from pool. Don't want to move the patio door either. 2) expansion: we would love a larger island. Seating is not necessary. If we were to expand, we would rather take out the buffet in dining room. We need to see if there will be structural limitations. The expansion into the side yard will cramp up the pool area too much. We would rather take the 19" from the dining room buffet assuming it won't obstruct flow of dining table. 3) we are willing to give up the desk area and see if we could move things down and open up the entry to dining room by the corner side. This option would leave us having to go around the family room when we come in from pool to shower. Ideally, I'd like to add a shower in the yard so this will only be a short term inconvenience. If we can't move the opening, we would like to see what else to use that space for. I would love some sort of nook seating. Would have to see what creative solutions we can come up with. Ann I would love to see pics of your pantry! Pantry: we love the closet pantry idea. Where and how to fit it in will depend on overall layout we choose. 4) without moving sink, we are exploring prep sink options. Ideally need a small garbage, soap and place to hang towel for this to work. 5) cabinets and storage is where we need to be careful to have adequate storage so we aren't tripping over each other. Right now our dishes are stored in the large drawer under cooktop because that's the only place they fit (cabinets have middle bar). It's a pain and we need to make sure our cabinet design solves all our storage and flow issues if we are keeping the u shape with island. 6) we find this plan really interesting except for the sink location. I wonder if a corner sink with a small end cabinet can work with this layout. Basically an l shape with a corner sink. I guess a g shape I think I have addressed everything that has been presented. Thank you all for your time and thoughts on this. We need to do some more research and see what options we have construction wise! And then weigh whether it's worth the cost.

Do you all think this is a crazy idea? I spent most of the day rearranging the furniture. Took the 2 IKEA bookcases away from the dresser side and tried them as headboards--sort of. Thought I was on to something brilliant until I discovered/remembered that one is the older model which had slightly thicker sides and so stands about one inch higher than the . Argh! (I moved the beds closer to each other which my husband likes. Will likely look for 2 adjustable lamps.) I know we could go get another of the newer style, but I don't know about how far the beds stick out from the wall now. Not that we were using that middle space, though. P.S. Yes, all of our curtains hang too high. We need a handyman to adjust them as my husband and I are incapable of hanging anything correctly. (Especially when not all the draperies are exactly the same length.)

To me, "club" means deep, rich colors, an intimate feel, a sense of history and tradition. To create that here, I would want different art, more widely spaced lamps, and probably a rug. Something like this, perhaps? The wood floor looks beautiful, and I hate to cover it, but I like the way a rug pulls a conversation area together. This one is a dark green for that color's golf reference; budget-friendly could skip the pattern and just use a bound carpet remnant. Floor lamps replace the table lamps. Photos of famous golf courses (calendar pictures?) in an eclectic collection of frames (from thrift stores?) fit within and therefore acknowledge the wall panels. Golf-related books, plants, a few accessories finish it. Incidentally, if the tables need refreshing, you could try stroking on a walnut varnish stain with a foam brush for a faux wood grain look. (I did a whole wall in my house that way and love it!) Try it in an inconspicuous spot first, though; it can be tricky to get it right.

Bengz - I have been pruning my shrubs for at least 20 yaars. I enjoy doing it. I do an adequate job most of the time. I did hire someone once to do general gardening and they weren't very good at a number of jobs I asked them to do, but I kept trying them on different tasks. When I asked them to prune, I was so surprised how instinctively good they were, that I focused all the work they did for me in the pruning department. I still have two very large Taxus, that they pruned that I have barely touched in years because I loved the outcome and they continue growing the way I want them to. They were entirely inexperienced and therefore inexpensive. They aren't available any more, unfortunately. I had hired a professional once specifically to do pruning and I had to stop them after a couple of attempts they were so bad. Some people just seem to have a natural gift. I have a small lot with a lot of mature trees around it and I'm trying to grow a lot of plants, so inevitably I have some areas where it's difficult to grow anything well. Between the shade and the tree roots, it's pretty noticeable that the conditions are not great. If you look at the internet photos I posted, that is what I was expecting to end up with when I bought these shrubs. And then compare those to the photos of my actual shrubs and I'm sure you can see that I would be disappointed with that outcome. So I may not ever end up with the ideal result, but I am hoping to try to improve them as much as I can. My usual, basic pruning skills seem to need an upgrade to figure out how to produce that improvement. But now that I think about it, I've only pruned the Holly that doesn't grow at all, once since I planted it and the other one I more or less left it on it's own to grow as well. So, maybe my usual efforts will give me better results than I thought. I did find a couple of YouTube videos that show moving and pruning a holly at the same time. So the Holly that has been barely growing, I am going to move in the spring and just use my basic pruning and see what I end up with. It'll be a good experiment. Thanks