Well...I'm the OP and macv is right, we DO have plans already and all I THOUGHT I wanted was to SEE stone/siding ideas on the exterior. We'd been feeling like chickens with our heads cut off and thought at least let's focus on THAT. What nobody here knew, and I didn't think was important at the time to mention, is we're still tweaking interior walls/rooms, etc. Now, after a recent conversation, we might even move out an exterior wall! PLUS, the whole thing was drawn using one brand of ICF with certain dimensions and we might not necessarily use that particular brand. We thought this was irrelevant if just wanting to try and figure out stone choices! I see now maybe it's not. Because I'm finally understanding (from this whole discussion) that the "shell" and interior walls and roof, etc. need to be accurate and drawn in first, in order to see the house in that awesome 3-D! format, I can't even begin to start with the outside look until the floorplan is figured out once and for all! BACKGROUND: I don't know if any of you have experienced this, but...because our building site is sooooo particular (ie: 1 side goes uphill, two sides go downhill or is close to a CLIFF, and one side is possible to alter) we actually did hire a designer to put our ideas to paper. The PROBLEM is that he charged us for every discussion (NO, we weren't pains in the butt and didn't bother him or change our minds over and over, it was just a major misunderstanding about how he charges and we didn't know any better). We've already spent $5,000 when we finally said enough is enough...and as I said before, we're discovering the floorplan is still not really right. (example: he drew a "winder" stairway that's only 36" wide not counting railing); the master suite is really, really cramped, etc! We trusted him as the "expert" and let him draw in a "bedroom" and the "stairs".....(in his defense, this is a Y-shaped home so spaces are a little tricky to fit everything in.) So. My dilemna wanting a program suggestion is probably NOW more to do with HAVING to DIY while we tweak the plans ourselves and THEN hiring someone AGAIN to put it in usable blueprints. ALL that everyone has said here has really helped me to understand the guts of architectural design and what one gets with one program over another. Being a real novice, I'm in the boat that I feel I HAVE to learn something (so, please...user friendly) because we just can't keep paying and paying and paying for more and more discussion about it. Don't get me wrong, I RESPECT the professional and I don't presume to be able to take their place when we need the REAL building plans. Does this make sense? PS: The above "cut & paste" idea is about my speed right now, but I intend to learn the technology to automate this process! One primitive thing I've already done though is make a foamboard model that I can hold in my hands and SEE! My original inquiry on this forum was resorted to because even my model is NOT FAST and easy to CHANGE if I'd come up with different ideas. ohhhhhhhhh boy...This project is fun...and isn't fun sometimes! Thanks for reading. The OP

I know I'm "late to the party" but... Practically the first thing I noticed is that except for the master bath and a tiny window in the combined laundryroom/PR, you don't have any windows facing to the sides of your house. Thus, every room in your home has windows on only one wall. IMHO, this is a huge mistake. Natural lighting is SO important to the overall feel of a room! Designing your home so that major rooms have windows on two wall so that they get natural light from two directions will have a HUGE impact on how "inviting" and "welcoming" your home feels. In A Pattern Language architect, Christopher Alexander wrote: "When they have a choice, people will always gravitate to those rooms which have light on two sides, and leave the rooms which are lit only from one side unused and empty. Therefore: Locate each room so that it has outdoor space outside it on at least two sides, and then place windows in these outdoor walls so that natural light falls into every room from more than one direction." This is SO TRUE! And most people don't even realize why they feel so much more comfortable in some rooms than in others. Light from two directions diminishes harsh shadows which, among other things, makes it easier for people to read one-another's facial expressions and thus to communicate. If you're not sure what I'm talking about, consider the difference between a portrait taken where the subject is carefully lighted from at least two sides and one taken of a subject outdoors, under harsh sunlight, with no fill flash. Houses designed for a typical narrow suburban lots seldom have rooms with windows on two sides BECAUSE putting windows on the sides of such homes would mean they would look out at the neighbor's wall 6 to 12 feet away! Not a great view and, if both neighbors had windows on the sides, no privacy for either of them. Most of the stock plans available on the internet were designed for the typical suburban lot. But, you're building on 3.7 acres! You won't have neighboring houses 12 feet away. You have the opportunity to do BETTER, to have a home that is light-filled and welcoming. I urge you NOT to settle for a made-over suburban starter-house plan. I have the same issue with that huge front facing garage. Front facing garages are pretty much a necessity on suburban lots where there is no room for a driveway leading to a garage in the back and certainly no room for a car to make a turn into a side-facing garage. But the result is that as garages get bigger and bigger to accommodate more and more cars, homes becomes: . GARAGEhouse with the garages dominating the house. Your garage takes up more than half of your front facade. Again, this is a typical problem with suburban starter-house stock plans. And again, you have 3.7 acres on which to build AND you're talking about building you "forever home." You have the opportunity to do so much better! Move the garage to the side at the very least. Even better, divide it up into a single car garage attached to the house (for the car that is driven most often by whomever buys the groceries and packs the kids around to their various activities) and add a stand alone two-car garage for the other vehicles that sits off to the side or is tucked back behind the house. So MUCH nicer looking AND it would free up a lot of exterior wall space in the house itself for rooms with windows on two sides. You've also already gotten some very good advice regarding: 1) traffic thru the kitchen area. (It really is not safe for the main flow of traffic in/out of the garage to pass right in front of the stove! And particularly unsafe if you have small children!) 2) twin sinks in a secondary bathroom that is to be used by children of both sexes. By the time they are 6 or 7, there is no way they'll both be using the sink at the same time. And, when your daughter hits puberty, she is going to want drawer space where she can hide away her sanitary supplies, makeup, etc from little brother's (and his friend's) prying eyes and fingers. A drawer or two (lockable) for each of them would be so much more useful than the extra sink. And, if two kids are going to be sharing the bathroom, it is MUCH more helpful to have a separate toilet/tub area from the vanity that twin sinks. With a separated toilet/tub area, one child could be brushing teeth and fixing hair while the other showers or bathes...both with a reasonable amount of privacy. 3) In your area of the country, I would imagine you need a larger entry closet than you have shown. And, where do you intend to keep things like brooms, mops, and the vacuum cleaner? Finally, I'm not a huge fan of that combined powder-room laundry UNLESS the only people that will be using it are family members. Real laundry rooms often have piles of dirty laundry waiting to go in the wash and stacks of clean clothes that need to be put away. Unless you are a compulsive house-keeper, your laundry room area is not going to always be pristine when guests arrive. (And even compulsive house-keepers usually can't keep the laundry room pristine once they have a couple of small children to take care of.) I would not want my guests having to stumble past dirty laundry on their way to the toilet. Do you? Frankly, I would start over fresh if I were you.

The dust is endless. Yes. Echo what everyone says---use plastic sheets over everything you can and put away everything you don't really need (baskets, pictures, paintings, etc.). Piled stuff in the wall unit and sealed it up. Our electric fry pan got a lot of use--everything from pancakes to grilled cheese, etc. If you have kids, leave out a few fun things--stuff for s'mores, toppings for ice cream. Make it fun and an adventure! Wine. One thing I'll add from personal experience---make certain your contractor knows where his crews will be getting water from and doing clean-up. We asked the contractor to install a slop sink in the garage (plumbing was already there for the W/D) when the main kitchen sink was removed. He didn't, and over the next four months we battled the contractors to avoid using the new silgranite sinks to mix grout and mortar, etc. In the end, while we were cordoned upstairs during wood floor refinishing, the floor guys left poly soaked cloths in the new sink---then used sandpaper to "remove" the stain a few days later. Now we're faced with the contractor having to replace the sink without damaging the new granite and cabs. So---make sure your contractors know which sinks/restrooms they are allowed to use and install a slop sink if you don't already have one.

shelayne,maryruth, marti8a, desertsteph, Thank you so much for your comments and support! mary ruth, LOL, I wish I had the tools and the talent. Marti8a, thanks, I am motivated mostly because it's a gift to myself, which is I guess a selfish thing, but I feel like I deserve to have some happiness cause you never know when it will end. Don't get me wrong, it is frustrating for it to take so long, but I just tell myself that it will happen in time. :) desertsteph, thanks too, you are right it is all about family being around me for Christmas, my DD and her SO, is understanding about some of the mess that is still left. Last year at Christmas it was a total disaster area and I could have no one over LOL,,I could barely squish by to get to room to room. So this year it feels great!