I've collected many things over the years. I've sold collections in order to make room for new collections. Both my DH & I love glass so it was a natural fit for collecting. We have several areas of interest including 17th & 18th century wine glasses (including flips) and decanters. We've also put together a rather large collection of 19th century barber bottles. I love the colors & decorations of these bottles. Our sunroom has exposed ceiling beams & the barber bottles sit on those beams where they catch the light from the paladium windows. They cast rainbows all over the room on a sunny day in late afternoon. They are stuck up there with museum gel. My favorite pieces of glass though are our "fire bombs". These are little, squat glass orbs (about 8" tall) with molded "legs" of sorts so they sit flat. They are filled with chemicals to extinguish a fire. Most kitchens had cases of these glass "fire bombs". If there was kitchen fire...you would throw one or two of these "bombs" at the fire to put it out. But, because of their nature there arent' too many of them still around. We've got fire bombs made from amber, amethyst, clear, cobalt, & a few different shades of green glass. To go along with them, we've collected late 18th & early 19th century leather fire buckets. These buckets have a fun history. In colonial New England, when there was a fire...everybody was expected to help put it out. Households had these leather fire buckets that held water. People would form a line from a water source to the fire & pass these buckets along the line with the last person tossing the water on the fire. After the fire was extinguished, people would toss their buckets into a big pile near the fire. Then, the town tax collector would go through the pile of buckets and return them. If you didn't have a representative bucket from your household...you were fined by the tax collector. For this reason, many of these old leather buckets have family names on them. My collection started when I found one in Exeter, NH with my family's name on it. My family was prominent in Exeter from the 2nd quarter of the 17th century (c. 1639-Revolutionary War) & I'm an amateur genealogist. So, this was an extraordinary find, for me. There is a garrison home still standing in Exeter that one of my ancestral grandfathers built c. 1690. It's a museum now. Anyway, someday, I will donate my fire bucket to this musuem since it bears the family name. So, there's so many ways collections can start & they can be literally anything that catches your interest. And, they don't need to be permanent. You can sell off one & start another when you either lose interest or run out of space. I tried to find a picture of a fire bomb on the Internet to attach but couldn't locate one...but here's a common barber bottle being offered on Ebay. Here is a link that might be useful: 19th Century Barber Bottle

LOL Dcarch. I notice no matter how frugal I am, I tend to open my wallet more willingly when I become a tourist. I bet the local businesses know that too! :-) Oh, the cost of labor is part of the reason for high cost foods in Hawaii. Not sure about now... when I was taking school break back in 1992, I took on a job working at Zippy's, a local fast food place. The US minimum wage was $4.25 an hour. I was paid $7.5 an hour to just buff tables and sweep the floor! I am sure kids who picked bananas and coconut were paid $7.5 an hour as well. When you add that labor cost onto a banana or that coconut, fruits that could be picked off a tree for free become almost unaffordable in the market. Sharon, I have seen people trying to grow Papaya tree in a pot but they don't usually grow that great. Not sure if the tree requires bigger roots or the fact that papaya trees are tall with nothing else to balance its weight. The tree won't grow much and fruits are usually very small. Now that I live in Canada :-( I would love to be able to grow ANYTHING! Nine months of winter in Calgary, not the best place on earth for farming, really! Al

It sounds like you love many colors. which is great! I'd like to offer some tips on seeing the colors accurately and with the least possible confusion: 1.Avoid using many chips or paint swatches on a wall at the same time. 2.Use the largest possible paint color cards that the manufacturer provides, even if you have to pay for them. It's going to be easier and less costly than repainting! 3. Use poster boards - even if you have to purchase a quart of paint: but be sure to prime the card stock first or it will buckle. Best to use an oil based primer. Zinnsner makes a good one, low (or non-) odor, fast drying. 4.When the primer is dry (allow around 2 hours), Follow the primer with 2 coats of ROLLED finish color. Forget the little brushes, it's just streaky and not realistic. With any brushes you will not get the surface density and color coverage as you will with rollers. 5.If you want to see what the color will look like, then, you need LARGE colored areas that you can move around the room in all times of day and night light, and that have a surface as close to your painted-wall as possible. From a quart of paint you can get 3 large poster board pieces of color (and much more actually if you need it). Wrap around corners; stack them floor-to-ceiling, behind furniture; on the ceiling, and more. Cut them up for trim-size shapes. Sound like a lot of work? It can be, but you might also get someone else to do that for you. That's what I always recommend as the first/best option when I encounter the issues (often!) in my color-consultation business. Hope it works for you! Here is a link that might be useful: Barbara Jacobs Color and Design

Thank you so much everyone! There certainly is a lot of good advice here (as always!). I think my biggest problem is that I have no idea how to define my "style". How would you describe the kitchens in the inspiration photos I referenced? Traditional? Something else? Katsmah: Your door looks great, and I'm relieved to see that others are planning a raised panel inset door! I would love to see pictures after they're installed! cali-wendy: Your kitchen is one of the many I have in my inspiration binders! I love the color -- it reads like a neutral cream (without a glaze?!?). I also like the raised panels in the ricklish kitchen. Our kitchen is a u-shape and is approx. 13' x 14' (with one wall a bit longer). We're planning three stacked cabinet uppers on each side of the range wall (with a hood in between) and three stacked cabinet uppers on each side of the sink wall, and the other wall will have the refrigerator with an armoire style pantry on each side. I'm not sure if this is a small, medium or large size kitchen (for style purposes), and what that number of cabinets translates into (i.e., would it look too busy with more detail or could it handle it?). We don't really have any other built-in cabinetry. Off the kitchen we have a very small mudroom that has beadboard approx. 3/4 of the way up one wall with hooks on it for coats, etc. and a pretty wide crown molding on top, and off that is a small powder room that has the same beadboard all the way around and the same crown, with a pedestal sink and a built in medicine cabinet with sconces on each side. Kind of Potterybarn-ish. Our room doors are all raised 6 paneled doors. What do you think all this tells me?!? Lavender Lass: We're leaning toward doing granite counters, although I LOVE pictures that have marble perimeters and wood islands. I just don't think it would be practical with two young boys. So I was planning to look into the granites that look like marbles. We haven't really given much thought to the backsplash yet, but I know I want something that blends in and maybe has a little sparkle. I don't want anything with too much color. For the walls, I was thinking a soothing grey or beige?!? We're keeping our hardwood floors, which are pretty light right now, but they will need to be refinished and we're considering going a little darker. The glass uppers will be clear glass with four panes (like a basic window) . I've really started liking the gothic glass uppers but I'm not sure they would go with the house. chicagoans: We are getting custom cabinets. Our cabinet maker is a dream come true, and he has been so patient and helpful! He has stopped by a number of times with different samples he's made for other clients, and he's bought me a number of kitchen magazines with pages marked with ideas that he thought I might like. I know he'll make me anything I ask, I just really want to narrow down my choices so I can limit how much I ask of him. But I'm sure you're right about having to see the combinations. Maybe a trip to the stone yard is in order! laurainlincoln: I wish I had one design feature I felt so strongly about, because I think that is a great way to approach it. The problem is that I'm on the fence about everything! Argh! Kaismom: I think the architectural style of our house is transitional colonial (i.e, built in 1997 with basic colonial layout but more open). We have 6 paneled raised doors, but some of our furniture has recessed doors. We have 3 piece crown moldings in most of the downstairs (so it's fairly large, but simple in design, meaning not dental or other details), with hardwood floors throughout. There are some internal arch doorways and the front windows have the arch above them, and french doors connect some rooms. I've been told our window have fairly large moldings and sills. What do you think all that translates into?!? missmuffet: That's a great idea. We have a binder that shows us all the different options for the panel and other details, but not different whole doors (maybe because they're custom made?!?). But we could certainly get some books at other kitchen places and go through that process! Thanks so much for your thoughts and ideas. It's all very helpful and gives me a starting point. I'm not quite as overwhelmed as I was last night!!!