Never throw away things that doesnt belong to you or both of you haven't agree on. I am not a hoarder and I keep my house pretty well organized. My husband is a control freak and wants to control everything. Long time ago I bought 2 patio chairs. He asked me if he can give them to his friend Bryan and I asked him why I should give his friend my chairs? He answered that we were planning to move and we will be buying new chairs. I firmly said NO!. I realized that the chairs were very close to the edge of our desk and when I was about to move them closer to the house he yelled at me asking me to let them were he put them. Two days after that the chairs disappeared. I asked him if he gave them to Bryan and he said no that he thought someone stole them. I start looking in the area and when looking at my neighbor's desk I saw what it seems to be my green chairs. A man that I don't recognized was painting them in red. I realized my husband never intended to give my chairs to his friend but to our "friendly" single woman which by the way I didn't want to do anything with her because her reputation of being super "friendly". In a second occasion he gave my extra pillows to his friend just because he thought I have too many pillows and he wanted to help him. He gave the pillows to him after I told him the extra pillows are for when we have visitors. By the way his friend is a millionaire that chooses to live humbly in order to keep accumulating money. I told him not to give the extra pillows to him but one day I was looking for them and they were gone! I was infuriated and started to realized that if my husband doesn't respect my things he doesn't respect me either. If he give them away even after telling him not to give them away the message he is sending me is..."I don't care what you said and I don't care if I hurt you, I rather make my friends happy than you". Recently we bought new chairs for the dinning room. He wanted to throw away the old ones but I found the old ones to be more comfortable that the new ones and I found a place for 2 of them in his office, one in our bedroom and another one in the second bedroom. I want to emphasize that it was plenty of space for the chairs in all the rooms. I put the one for the second bedroom in the garage because my mom uses wheelchair. He took advantage that my mom was with us and I was busy all day long 7 days a week to put the chair in the van and give it away to someone I know. If the chair being in the garage bothers him more that hurting my feelings then is clear he doesn't feel any respect for me. Please people unless your partner is a hoarder is not worth to destroy your relationship with your spouse over material things. Things can always be replaced but once you loose trust in your spouse that is very difficult to gain back! (P.S. Pardon my grammar English is my second language)

dian57 - At least in your case concrete is a "known" flooring material. mustbnuts - The lights were found for me by sheilaaus122. See the link below for info. I do love them. Oh, and we have two bathrooms, a front bump-out and a great room addition to go. One step at a time. sheilaaus122 - Thanks. Yes, that is the "wide" view of our modest kitchen. I know what you mean by the focusing thing. I've done that pretty much every step. (Oh - don't let Hubby know I said anything but I kind of like the light natural floor. Probably because it's such an improvement over what we've had.) Regarding the pendant height - I'm not entirely sure. I do know that they're lower than the "norm" due to limitations (crappy dropped ceiling). The pendants came with three "tubes" for suspending the light. So there's one "tube" which I believe is 12" and then the heart design and the shade. I'm not at home right now but will measure when I get home. amcofar - That's too funny. Unless they change the Constitution to allow dogs or parrots to be President that'll never happen, though. ci_lantro - Yes indeed. I worked with Hubby some last night to "rack" the floor and I'm just amazed by the transformation already. The wood is just sooooo beautiful. lynninnewmexico - The trip is primarily for business but I do hope to squeeze in a little fun. At least it will get us away for the kitchen chaos for a few days. flowerchild - That actually sounds like it was a lot of fun. Here is a link that might be useful: the lighting thread

Glad you hired the decorator sarina. I too felt the White Ice was too cool/greyish to go with your warm beigey floor. Don't worry, you will find something. Good idea to have them bring down the Venetian Beige too. And why don't you call them tomorrow and ask if they have any others slabs with a warm beigey/cream/ivory tone - they're sending down slabs anyways, what's a few more? I assume you will have the decorator look at the new slabs too,. It is very difficult, but don't settle. Sometimes you end up with something completely different than what you had originally planned. My DH and I went to 4 different slab suppliers and changed our whole idea - we had originally wanted a whiteish background with taupe/ivory and a bit of grey or black running through it. Guess what - we ended up with Desert green granite - we have soft green walls, and dark khakiish green leather seat covers on our dark grey wrought iron kitchen chairs. The Desert Green granite just tied it all together, looks amazing against my honey coloured shaker maple cabinets. We got a soft green glass textured BS with ivory grout - my floor is a floating floor of Pergo tiles in ivory/taupe, a bit of grey/ a bit of the honey colour of the cabinets. Everyone who comes into my kitchen loves it.

Vap, I did look into Bolero. It is beautiful but I need to see about the heat wise. I am not sure but I think I am on borderline of zone according to Dave's garden. I will check later again. Vap, that is so cool what your husband did . Surprised, surprised :) SoFl, your husband is awesome also. I am glad mine is awesome too. All he did was here my credit card have fun . He cooked dinner and all. SoFl, I did order Lichfield Angel.. Thought, it was lighter color but turns white due to heat/sun. It is white ,duh...haha. I keep forgetting it is white. How is Scepter'd Isle and Tess of the d'Urbervilles ? Lavenderlace, thank you . I think magenta is ok. I might put Ebb in afternoon shade- maybe. I had this feeling , I am moving all the roses as Not plan in my garden due to heat, burn and what not. What do you guys recommend for BS during rainy seasons? Jin