Amanda, I think the heart pine will give you enough contrast with your other woods that it would be fine for the floor, if you want a wood floor, and it'll certainly go with the Colonial house. If you want tile, which will be colder, though very easy to care for, consider 1'x2' French pavers. They're a light terra cotta, and very traditional in kitchens. The antique ones are very expensive, but there are new ones of the type being made now. For authentic Colonial, I think a gray slate kind of look would be more on point, but it would make your kitchen look dreary, whereas the light clay look of the French pavers would be cheery and should go with your big brick hulk. :) Even though you've spec'd a lot of wood, with the painted section, and the windows, and the brick fire surround, and the flow into the dining room, I think you have enough relief that you can go a bit wild in the kitchen with the woods and get away with it. Especially with all the different kinds and colors you've chosen, which provide you with contrast and interest. You have the whole warm side of the color wheel (i.e., analogous colors) -- to throw some logic at you. :) Floor: yellow-brown (I'd go natural on them. They'll age to a really nice honey color.) Cabinets: red-brown Island top: dark red-brown Beams: charcoal-brown Hood: orange-brown For hue and brightness contrast you have the silver-gray stainless counters and the white cabinets. You can do window treatments whose main job is to bling up your black hole windows at night. There are slat blinds that have art painted on them, for instance. You could do a lacy shade. Or something baroque and flocked. Shades are pretty inexpensive, and can be changed out when you get tired of them. And they don't get into the soup, and hide pretty well when they're up. You can even do clear vinyl and let your kids paint on them for each season, then wash them off and start over. One of the great things about all of your colorblocking is that you don't really need a lot of bling to make the kitchen lively. Add in the detritus of family life and you're there. Plus, you also have hardware (i.e., jewelry) to choose. You can go simple and demure, in a silvery color to go with the stainless counters, but you could do art glass or wild granite knobs, colored resin bar pulls, Anne At Home theme hardware, or whatever suits your fancy. Some hardware looks dumb in some settings, but I think your kitchen can take a lot of interest without feeling overdone. I mean, how much bling do you want?

You have room for 1 island and a small almost bisto sized table and chairs, or 2 small islands. I can't see where a second island or even the breakfast table will go that won't interfere with some traffic pattern through to the sunroom or family room. You don't have enough walls to have a true "nook". Maybe make the openings to the sunroom and family room smaller (but maybe with window passthroughs) so you have some wall space to anchor a table that will keep it out of the traffic flow. Orienting the island parallel to the refrigerator wall/sink wall doesn't really leave you enough room to open the refrigerator or have passers by behind the seating. The long side should be parallel to the cooktop wall. Plus, your prep sink is in the wrong location/isn't shown on the smaller island. It should be closer to the cooktop where you'll need it most, and also close to the fridge side. What is the purpose of the butler's pantry? You have a wine cooler in the main kitchen, and you have a huge pantry wall, and the cleanup sink and dish storage is about as far from the dining room as you can get. So, what purpose does having a butler's pantry serve? If it is to be a true butler's pantry, it would be better to have the cleanup sink on the fridge wall with maybe a passthrough to the butler's pantry so that dishes could be stored there, and that's probably the better location for "adult beverage" storage and the glasses associated with it. Or, it could be a true pantry, and you could eliminate much of that very expensive "wall of tall" that you have going on. You need to define your wants/needs better, and you need to actually "walk the walk" in your mind and think about the paths you'd need to put away groceries, or clean up after a meal. What you have looks pretty, but it doesn't function well.

Like others have posted here, I think it's not about skills - it's about finding enjoyment in your yard amidst the trials of your circumstances. On another thread, we've all been posting about the hardest thing about growing roses in our regions and everyone has reasons outside of their control about why the roses aren't performing to our expectations. Sometimes the only response is to temper our expectations of the roses and ourselves. You're not in charge of the heat of your climate, so it's not something dependent on your skills. If your roses are taking a break, you can consider this an opportunity for a break for yourself. I sympathize because I log in here to GW roses and look at everyone's gorgeous roses and set my vision of what I want to see from my roses from that. However we all post the photos when our roses are looking their best unless we're trying to resolve a particular problem. Nobody's roses always looks their best - heck, I've logged into threads I started with photos of my own roses and sigh because I wish my roses looked that good. In my best rose flush ever a few years ago, I posted photos a month later of how virtually nothing was blooming anywhere that season, more than usual, because all the roses that bloomed at the same time were also resting at the same time. So I have to temper my expectations - if I want constant bloom distributed among the roses, it won't be profuse simultaneous bloom at any given time. If I get a flush like you had, there'll be a substantial break for a while. That's not my "fault", it's just how roses work for the most part. Hang in there and keep looking for a balance in your garden and perspectives. I plant other perennials and annuals that fill the gaps in roses so I can have color year-round, but even then it's not profusion, just enough to feed the soul in between rose joys. If our roses bloomed fantastically all the time, we'd probably take them for granted (like people in some climates get too used to sunny mild temperatures year round). Part of the fun of rose growing is the potential for being surprised, and in order to be surprised there needs to be a pause of expectation. That's where you are now, so breathe and enjoy the "what if" that's down the road. Cynthia

We don't know the dimensions of the space, so it's difficult to give you any really useful advice -- we're guessing! So, please post a sketch with the dimensions, preferably wall-to-wall, not cabinet-to-cabinet. If you cannot do wall-to-wall, then to/from the items that stick out the farthest...things like appliance handles, counter edges, walls, etc. One thing I will note is that a 24" or 27" deep counter is barely usable for prepping b/c you have to worry about things falling off the back. I have that on one of my peninsulas and I don't like prepping there for that reason. Perimeter counters work b/c you have a wall behind them to stop things from falling. In the meantime, the following Kitchens Forum FAQ might help: FAQ: Aisle Widths, Walkways, Seating Overhangs, Work/Landing Space etc https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5500771/faq-aisle-widths-walkways-seating-overhangs-work-landing-space-etc [Taken from the "Read Me" thread]