I think there are 12 symbols in the Chinese Zodiac symbols set, one for each month. (In Chinese resturants, I've seen 12 symbols on place mats. This is not the best place for documenting information.)

I honestly think you should take a deep breath and back off from any plan to "finalize" next week. Your plan needs a LOT of work. In answer to your questions: Too many windows? No! Well, you might have too many in the great room but the other rooms could use more windows. And, as another poster has already pointed out, you've wasted prime exterior wall space - especailly corners - for closets that don't need windows! Natural light coming from 2 directions makes a room feel SO much more livable so those corners should be dedicated to prime living areas. Also, in deciding the number and placement of your windows, you should also take into condideration the climate you live in. Spend some time looking at some green-building sites and you'll see what I mean. Enough wall space? That is hard to say. Depends on how much furniture you have and how you like to place it. Your posted image isn't large enough to see the dimensions of various rooms. It would help if you would tell us the dimensions of each "box." My suspicion is that the interior dimensions of each module are something like 13 ft wide x 55 ft long - which means that none of your rooms can be wider than 13 feet. That could create furniture placement issues in the great room b/c, with only 13 feet to work with, you're going to be pretty much forced to push some sofas and/or chairs up against the walls. River water, sand and clay/ mud around, and only one entry. Yes, this is a problem. And, with small children it is going to be a MAJOR problem. You NEED a side entry with a mudroom. I'm assuming you're planning a stand-along garage. If so, it ought to be located on the kitchen side of the house and your side entry and mudroom should be on that side as well. That way, you won't have to lug grocerys clear around to the front door and acoss the house to reach the pantry. I'd shrink the foyer by half and then double the pantry area and then make it include a mudroom and a side door. 15-foot high basement with 9 ft and 10 ft ceilings on main and second floors - will it look funny? I think it'll look okay from the front - though the steep roof line may make the roof a bit too prominent especially with such a plain-looking front elevation. From the back and sides, I think those floor heights could wind up looking pretty awkward. Especially since, if I understand you correctly, you won't actually have a basement at first... just some arches that will support the module that is at the back. That means that the space under your house will be open to the elements (and critters). Frankly, I would go aheard and have my builder do the necessary regrading to provide for a reasonable height basement and then I'd enclose the space properly even if it was left unfinished. Heck, depending on whether you can build a driveway to get aound to the back, the "basement" it might be a great spot for your garage. Besides, your plans show stairs going down to a basement. Is that door going to just open up to a hole under the house until you get around to finishing the basement???? With small children, I definitly would not want to live in a house with that situation - even for a few years till we could get the basement finished. Plus, you're likely to find that insurance companies will refuse to insure you if you have a door that can be opened (even if kept locked at all times) to what is essentially a hole in the ground. Enough storage spaces? No! You need storage in office/schoolroom/current children's room. You need a mudroom. You need space for more wall cabinets in the kitchen. Your masterbedroom closet is plenty large, but is not laid out for maximum storage. Your utility room needs more storage and a spot to fold clothing and lay things like sweaters out while they dry. Your pantry is plenty big but is a long dark narrow tunnel. It needs some wide/deep shelves for things that won't fit on a 12" deep shelf. Your entry way closets are miniscule. Unless you're planning to have a tankless water heater or two, where will you hot water heater go? With 2300 sq ft on the first floor and 1600 sq ft (eventually) on the second - even if you don't heat/cool the basement, you're probably going to need two HVAC units and I don't see any spot for them. Even if you plan for those to go in the attic/2nd floor, if you plan to eventually heat/cool any portion of the basement, you're going to need chases to run ductwork down to the basement. If your plans don't specify where those chases are to be placed, the HVAC guys will tend to just run 'em thru whatever closet is handy - thereby further reducing storage space. Speaking of HVAC units, if they will be in the attic/2nd floor, you need to have planned the 2nd floor enough so that you don't wind up with ducts crisscrossing thru areas that you want to turn into 2nd floor living space. Now, my 2cents on style and livablity issues: Style: I have to agree with previous posters re your home elevations. Double windows with "shutters" make me shudder. (pun intended). Shutters originally served a purpose. They closed over a window to provide additional protection against storms. Even when shutters are merely decorative, they ought to LOOK like they can still serve their purpose or they just look silly. The front of your house would look much nicer and more balanced with four separate windows, each with shutters that fit the window. And, since you don't have a porch, your front door NEEDS some kind of overhang to protect it. Plus a small gable over the front door extending outward to create a small front porch would lend some style to an otherwise very plain front elevation. Since the roof is so steep, I think the front elevation would be improved by the addition of dormers. Dormers would also bring additional light into the upstairs rooms when you get the 2nd floor finished out. I'm sorry but your back elevation looks totally haphazard. YOu have too may different sizes and styles of windows with no pattern to their distribution. Pick one style and size of window and stick with it. If you have to use a different window in the bathroom, it should at least be chosen to coordinate with the other windows. If you have double hung windows everywhere else, the bathroom windows could be chosen to be the same size as the upper half of the double-hung windows. If you feel that you MUST have some wider windows in the greatroom, at least make all the windows the same height and style. All double hungs. Or, if you want a picture window with smaller windows to the sides, use casement windows that are the same height as the central picture window. I'm assuming your views of the valley are to the east. Have you considered that you may someday want to add a deck off the back to further enjoy the views? Wouldn't it be a good idea to plan a spot for a patio door in the great room? As drawn, your side elevations are simply wrong. Neither side elevation shows the 2nd floor dormers and both of them should. And, the left side elevation shows a door opening into the west edge of the study instead of the window in the middle of the room that your floorplans clearly show. These kinds of errors make me wonder just how qualified your builder's "architect" is. Livability: The foyer is way too big. The dining room may be too small for a large family (hard to tell without dimensions). The kitchen doesn't seem very workable. To get to the pantry, one must walk right past the stove. I much prefer to see stoves tucked out of the way as much as possible. The stove, main sink, dishwasher and refrigerator are all basically line up in a straight line - which would be okay except that that "line" is the area of the kitchen you will use 90% of the time. So that means the rest of your kitchen is likely to get very little use. Problem is, with the island stuck in the middle, moving any of the major appliances would mean you'd have to walk around the island to get from one appliance to another so you need a complete redesign. The secondary bathroom (that you need as long as the kids are using the study as their bedroom) is poorly positioned for access from the study or access from the family room. The laundry room is too small for a large family and it is going to be difficult to run a vent for your dryer. While some European countries don't require dryers to be vented to the outside, US codes do require venting - and their are rules limiting just how long and how many turns the dryer vent can have. Since you're going to have a high 2nd floor (and apparently haven't yet designed the floorplan for that floor), you need to make certain that you CAN vent the dryer now and that the dryer vent placement won't impede your 2nd floor design later. Would be terrible if the vent ran right up thru the middle of where you HAD to have an upstairs hallway and you couldn't move the vent b/c you'd already maxed out on length and number of turnings in the vent pipe. Okay - that's a lot of words for my 2cents worth but, hey, I work cheap. LOL! Good luck.

--It is the mortgage scenarios with no future prospect, goal or even intent of ownership that I have trouble getting my head around. Like credit card debt becoming so "normal". Basically, one can have pretty much anything without really ever owning it.-- I definitely see your point. I have a friend who thinks Donald Trump is the bomb. I once pointed out that he's had a bankruptcy or two... her response was something along the lines of that being not such a bad thing in a business situation, actually sort of a kind of business plan. Mind you, this is someone who's very responsible with her own finances and wouldn't dream of cheating someone she owes money to. Somehow she didn't make the connection that when businesses go bankrupt, there are people who are not getting paid. Mr Trump uses other people's money to finance his deals, then doesn't pay them back. ugh. Ok, maybe he didn't plan it, but how can he be a good business man if his investors lose money (and why do people keep investing with him)? On the other hand, I think there's a big difference between that kind of thing and on the personal scale credit card or other unsecured debt, vs. mortgage or other secured debt. I did have a couple thousand in credit card debt at one point in my life (ironically because I was trying to avoid debt; I underestimated what I would need to survive my last year in college and didn't take out enough on my student loan. ha.) but at this point in my life, it would take a very dire emergency to take that on again. I suppose it was a fairly dire emergency at the time (I needed to eat), but if it hadn't been temporary, I would have found other solutions (cheaper living situation, fewer classes to pay for, etc). Meanwhile, I do have a mortgage and I do pay the minimum while investing about $1000/month in mutual funds. I have about half my outstanding principle saved (not counting retirement accounts). Will I pay it off when I have the full amount? I actually don't know. Partly that will depend on mortgage rates at the time (right now I have an ARM that makes its first adjustment in a couple years). Partly, it will depend on what I'm doing in my life. It would be wonderful to have a paid-off house, on the other hand, it would also be wonderful to have enough money in savings that I could quit my job, go to grad school, travel for a year, etc, if I got the urge. However, regardless of whether or not I keep the mortgage, having debt against an asset, you at least still have a positive (or neutral at worst) net worth. Using a credit card to buy consumables, you end up with just the debt. I don't know. Maybe the average person doesn't make the distinction and the idea that debt (including mortgage) is normal feeds the inclination to run up credit cards, etc.

How did the county know the property was split, wouldn't they require a copy of the plat showing the now two pieces of property? The county doesn't look at the plat. It uses the legal description in the deed. Without a deed or a court order, the property doesn't transfer. Surveys aren't always done, and when done, aren't always recorded. Locals rules may vary on this, of course. Someone wrote a legal description of the property to be split off. If it wasn't taken from a survey, the description may be faulty. You can have a faulty legal description corrected, but it is an extra step, and someone may contest it. BTW, if there is no current survey, the title insurance you receive will not cover boundary disputes.