I agree reusing peat pellets is asking for trouble. You might get away with it if you sow outside but inside you have to be pretty careful not to create damp off. I use regular hydrogen peroxide to saok up seeds and have not seen any harm, also I did not see that is speeds up germination/ although my seeds do tend to germinate fast but I use optimum temps and lights and I had no control groups to experiment properly/. I really do not like starting in the trays since as you mentioned some seeds germinate fast and some don't and you wasting precious space under lights. My personal preferences lie toward Promix and using starting tray or pot, placed in the plastic bag or under plastic cover. I transplant my seeds as they germinate and use 7-7-7 fertilizer starting about half strenght and adding as seedlings grow. I have great results and so far very little no- germination or damp off. About eggplants and peppers- they really like it hot and will germinate and grow great with lots of light and gentle bottom heat. If you can't provide those conditions now you might want to start them later- your harvest will be later but you will have it.

Kitchenmom - Where are you buying your Toto? The reason I am asking is that, as I mentioned in my post above, my Toto Ultramax was installed by a guy who worked in the store where I bought it. He had been working for the store for years, and installed many of these, so he had the expertise. The store added $75 or $100 (I can't remember) for the installation, which I thought was reasonable, given what a plumber would have charged to come out and do it. So if you are buying your Toto from a nearby store, can you check with them whether they offer the installation service?

I agree on having our kids appreciate what they have. They really don't know how good we've had it! We have 1 incredibly small bathroom we are sharing (that right there has been a growing experience for me - not loving that nor the lack of water pressure - ack). It's an old home - as in no outlets or switches in one of the bedrooms upstairs. They were sharing a room but they've already rearranged. The room without any outlets also doesn't have a heat vent so I don't see my oldest staying in there come winter - but it is also the largest of the 2 rooms. :) We also have no dishwasher and no a/c. Those are basically the comforts that we had that we are now getting used to being without. I keep reminding myself that there is no perfect home and surely there will be things after living with it that we might think are too large, too small or a little off one way or another. Our pantry is pretty sizable - fits our chest freezer which I'm excited about but the doorway is off the kitchen, not IN the kitchen proper. That bugged me for a while but I think it's going to be okay. I was off a bit on my $250k number - dh informed me that it's more like $280k. :( Besides the roofing the other number that came in considerably higher than we thought was lumber. It recently took a jump so that was a bit disappointing. We are hoping to get all of our quotes by the end of the month so we can lock in our I/R before it also takes another jump. We will be doing all priming, painting, laying wood floor, tile, setting cabinets, some trim work, putting stone on fireplace (we have done that before and it's actually a very rewarding project but took way longer than we thought), hardware on doors and cabinets, lighting, ceiling fans. We too will be doing some of those very things you mentioned after the fact. Definitely closets and even the small office we have will be done after we are in. With work schedules and keeping timing on track it may come down to having to hire things out that we originally planned on DIY. We are not moving communities or school districts and are paying rent so time is money to a certain degree. For now though that is what we hope to do in sweat equity. I think you are wise to start working through house plans now. There are certainly many details to ponder. We were hoping to be about 2000 sq feet total for the main and upstairs but ended up at 2400. We don't feel the rooms are excessively large or that we have rarely used rooms so we went ahead with it. I had a few things that I really wanted configured a certain way and made sure they were laid out accordingly. After those boxes were checked I really didn't feel so picky about the rest. Hopefully they will live how I feel they will in my mind! :)

I put Drake II, 1.28 gpf, elongated bowl, universal height, cefiontect glaze toilets in my new house and I've been very happy with them after 4 months. They work a lot better than the 3 gpf contractor specials in my old house. I've never used the 1.6 gpf model. But since I'm in a very dry area of the country and on septic I wanted a low use model and have not been disappointed.