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.

many of the pre finished colors from nichiha are very shiny. i was very concerned about this, as when the sun shines directly on it there's a substantial "glare". i'm thrilled however with our nichiha in weathered gray. there is no sheen as on the other wood stains. the macadamia stain doesn't seem to have it either. i'm planning on taking some pics tomorrow. neither our architect or builder had used (or even heard of) nichiha before our job and were using the hardi products. architect told me the other day he's spec'd it on four other houses and builder loves it since there was no breakage during install ...so no waste. i'll post back with pics of our shingle style tomorrow!

Lucky you, being able to reuse your cabinets. Ours were in terrible shape. Your choices sound great. I can understand your excitement. I don't really have any advice, as we've only just started our DIY, but I just wanted to wish you good luck with the process.

Landlord had come into the house shortly after my departure ... locked the porch door behind him, I guess. He was a bit distressed about the locked door, the cats had gone without food for a while, finally he'd climbed in through the back window ... and had moved the cat food up near the window so that he could get at it from the ground outside. I haven't asked him why he didn't open the door when he was inside the porch. He used the tiller to chew up a large number of weeds in the garden and son and friend helped, so much of the need has been met. There's a proliferation of lettuce and beans everywhere ... plus some zucchini, a few of which the weeders took home and landlord would like a couple. Got some U.S. money, so am nearly ready to go. Niece is asking for some time off. Send your best wishes for a safe journey, please. ole joyful P.S. Succeeded in avoiding political messages, this time. I think. o j