dixie I won't stop providing counter arguments as long as there are inflamatory statements made like the ones below - which happen to come from MA in a recent thread. But it wouldn't have mattered who posted them, the response from me would have been the same. I find it disturbing that there is no declaration by MA right up front that he is an architect so that the OP's (especially new posters) know the perspective from which his views are derived. In all of the other forums that I read and post on, this is the norm by true professionals in their respective fields. "I suspect that much of the savings from the use of prepackaged designs and/or incomplete documents is subsequently given to the builder in change orders or noncompetitive cost plus billing. Why are owners so stingy with designers and so generous with builders?" "I think the bottom line is that in addition to a lower hourly fee, a home designer must be providing an abbreviated set of contract documents which inevitably exposes the owner to more risk and therefore more cost. I believe this must account for half or more of the design fee savings." "I can see how these approaches could work for off-the-shelf designs or for spec houses but my practice is for completely custom original designs tailored to the needs of the homeowner's family and the site. A stock plan would be useless even as a starting point and the plans given to me by owners usually just slow down the initial design phase and increase my fee. "

"Oddly enough, I am sort of excited about cleaning my own house again. I have a whole routine that I've come up with, and I am going to buy myself some lovely cleaning supplies to make it more fun. I bought a new broom over the weekend, so that's a start. I can tell already that DH is nervous that he may have to participate in the cleaning. But DD has 1/2 day of school every Friday, usually hard to get anything substantial accomplished, so I decided Friday morning will be my cleaning time. Like you all need to know that. ;)" It's great that you have a positive attitude and enthusiasm about a new task! Now that I have cleaning help I have quickly moved to the 'cold dead hands' camp, as in that is what it would take to pry my housekeeper away from me :). I cannot overstate how wonderful it is to come home every 2 weeks and have the house sparkling clean. And to know that I will not be on my hands and knees resentfully spending an entire Saturday scrubbing the house while the rest of the family enjoys their weekend. Over the holidays the cleaning day happened to fall on Xmas, so I had to do it myself and boy was that a PITA. It is certainly a luxury but it's one I truly and deeply appreciate.

I have most of the books for this diet. I will tell you my mid 20's daughter did go by the diet and lost a lot of weight. The draw back, she likes BEEF and PORK. Her type is A- and this is not condusive for her to totally follow the diet. The most interesting thing I found is the foods that don't digest so well or I notice talk back are all listed on my DO NOT EAT list. I created a diet for myself about 5 years ago before reading the EFYRT books and lost 40 pounds in about 8-10 weeks without going hungry and getting more and more energy. I got the book and compared my personally created diet to the list of foods......WOW... low and behold ALL of the foods included were on my VERY BENEFICIAL list. So you tell me, is this just a coincidence? Now if we take a moment and think about the indians who have been living to ages twice of the white man for hundreds of years. If we examine their habits, we will see they believe you are what your eat. They were smart enough to see that different herbs, foods provided by the earth could and did prevent and cure many of all types of ilnesses and more. Each body is different from the next just as cars are. My car performs better with Chevron gas than BP gas. Now why would my body not perform better with one food than another? It is commons sense and although the results in the book are not written in stone, it is certainly a very good outline to start your journey on. Best of luck to you.

Texasgal I agree with both you and annkh. I think the issue I am having is that I have not seen anything that I think would make my heart sing each time I walk into my kitchen and it is because of working with the oak cabinets and wainscoat. Yes they are in good shape but to me they are old and tough to marry old with new. I did go to the granite warehouse on Saturday, it was "interesting" and a little overwhelming. After walking through the entire place with my cabinet door in hand, there was only one I kept going back to and also the sales person assisting me and it was not too busy of a pattern and soft pretty colors of cream, gray and scant of brown/gold. The granite is Absolute Cream and he thought a "C". Do I love the granite, yes it is very pretty, do I love it for my old house, with all of the oak? I am not sure. Some of the granite did knock my socks off and I would joke that what I really wanted was the house or the cabinets that went with that gorgeous slab but it was not right for my wood or eat in kitchen. So in order to spend the $$$ I have to be sure I love it and that is not happening yet with granite, quartz or formica. I am a bit burned out from the experience so far. It seems a neutral formica would be best but I already have that and not too bad a shape either. Sunday I did another visit to the big box stores to look at laminate again. Kept an open mind, looked closer at all of them as to not rule any of them out. Did any of it sing to me, not really. Can't see the shiney surface of some of the new stuff on my counters as my lighting causes too much glare and back to the issue of choosing a pattern that is not too busy with the oak and then have to coordinate a floor. Looked at the sinks that would be top mounted with laminate as no one recommends undermounting a sink with it and the ehhh, my blue sink is beautiful compared to them. Do you see where I am going with this? lol All I really need is a floor, paint, new light and hardware and until something seem "right" I will remain in this redecorating limbo. Throwing out that sink for a stainless or another enamel sink in another color seems frivolous. Also it does appear navy is coming back as is gold and I already have it! I reread my original topic of Updating a country kitchen and the first advice posting was to work with what I had. I should have stopped right there. Today I will get the estimate for the Absolute Cream granite I looked at. I would love nothing more than to coordinate a counter, sink and floor that makes me feel this is all worth it; time, money and effort. I have attached a picture of my "wood" for those who have not following my dilemma in my other posts to indicate why it is difficult to choose a color an material. Here is a link that might be useful: December 29th-original post