it is TRYING to heal from an egregious historical wound .. that happened God knows how many years back ... WELCOME TO GW and the tree forum ... it may or may not survive.. and it may take 5 or 10 years to die ... and i would invest nothing into it ... and if it bugs you.. get rid of it.. and plant a replacement in the NEXT PROPER PLANTING SEASON... which i would guess is not june/july or august .. in TX ... frankly ... on my 5 acres.. i could ignore it forever.. but i dont know if if could leave that thing on my front lawn as the only tree out there.. a pride thing ... good luck ken ps: i used big words because you were wearing a starched long sleeve white shirt.. in TX in the afternoon .. lol ...

Here is a link to the owners manual for your mower. There are step by step instructions with pics. Hope this helps Here is a link that might be useful: X304 Manual

Very pretty little house and that red is just luscious in the evening light in the photo! Definitely do NOT lop off the side porch. It would change the look significantly and not save you very much money. Besides, the side porch may be wide enough as it is to hang a small (4ft wide) porch swing in front of those two front-facing great room windows and then that side porch could become a favorite "get away" spot. But, since you're going to be making the great room wider, I'd suggest making the front porch a little wider also and then you'd definitely have room for a porch swing. And, if you don't include the side porch stairs but closed it up like in the photo, you could also put a small round table and a couple of wicker chairs in the corner and turn the side porch into a lovely and useful "outdoor room." BTW, I think MrsPete meant that the e-space serves the purpose of allowing more LIGHT into your kitchen, not more "lint." LOL! I think making expanding the laundry room would be more likely to do the latter. ;-) I don't think the MBR is large enough to put yet another door into it so that you have direct access to the spa. But, if you do decide to go ahead and expand the laundry room, consider stealing back a little of the extra laundry room space to make the powder room a tiny bit wider also and then replace the PR window with a half-light patio door so you have access to the PR from the porch and spa. With a door out thru the PR, I don't think you would really need a door from the MBR out to the back porch because it would be easy enough to cut thru the PR. Since you don't have a basement, I'm wondering if there is anyway to incorporate the space under the stairway landing to expand the MBath a little bit. Depends on how much headroom you would have I guess. It might be nice to be able to move the door to the master closet into the master bath but to do that, you would probably want to put the shower up where the toilet room currently is. That's why I'm wondering if you could use the space under the landing to expand the bath slightly. I think the bath and bedroom are workable as is tho so I wouldn't go nuts trying to change things.

Thank you so much for your help. TTodd, I know the blue/green/gray can read very cold. The walls are cold now - and they are Shaker Beige - which I did not think would turn out this way. Anyway, the chips are my kitchen and dining room so I may need to head more to the greens than the blues. I have seen so many rooms that I love. The trouble is when I try to recreate them for myself, it doesn't work. I see so many beautiful rooms, then look at mine with a yuck. The door by the recliner does lead outside to the garage. I have my office in part of the living room (never used) at the other end of the house. Palimpsest - yes, I need to move that. Gracie, I think that I do have too many small items in the room. I think I am going to really have to edit. I love all of my stitcheries (although I have taken a few down) - love the antique pieces --- but some things do have to leave. Jan, thank you so much for the visual. I don't know if I can go too green, but I think I can use a more saturated color in there. The furniture is around the perimeter. I did have the sofa pulled away from the wall with the desk against the half wall and a walkway in between - left little room fir when the grandkids come over and play. I think I have too much wood in the room and need to edit some out - then a new sofa, a couple of new chairs. I am also going to try to use the spinet desk as a table between the chairs and see what happens. Thanks so much to all of you for your time.