luckygal - Wow, so many great suggestions, I don't know where to begin! Thank you so much! I like the idea of marrying the colors with the fabrics, and carefully bringing in the secondary colors - I have a feeling it's going to take some trial and error to get the right balance of color, but that's part of the fun - right? The blue mason jars, fabric valance, and wood blinds all sound lovely! I'll play around with fabric prints and colors some more too. As for my style, as I look through my inspiration photos, it seems to be simple, clean traditional (lots of white kitchens), with some cottage and french country touches - nothing too fancy, fussy or rustic. I think modern traditional/cottage would be a good description. The rest of our new fixer upper house is a blank slate right now, so I think I need to be careful to keep the same feel in our fairly open first floor. Thank you again for your fantastic ideas! :) nosoccermom - That is a Very good point! My mockups were probably not very fair to H and I. I've added some "beadboard" to the mockups below. (Well, to the best of my ability!) Fun2BHere - So glad you like it! I'll definitely take a trip to the fabric store before committing to anything. And thanks for the ikat link! lavender_lass - You changed your vote! So, green walls/backsplash with tiny touches of blue - got it! :) I have so many different combinations of colors to try! (The key for me is going to be keeping it fun instead of stressing about it!) I'm 99% sure we're going to keep the butcherblock. :) Thanks again for your suggestions! andreadeg - You are too sweet! Thank you! :) I agree with you completely about the beadboard width. I think we definitely need a wide beadboard or v groove plank since our cabinets are so chunky. Do you think the width of the backsplash planks should match the cabinet stile and rail width exactly (3.5") or should be a touch bigger or smaller? That's a great idea to get the lighting installed and let things "brew" some more (I am itching to get the chandelier hung!). I think we'll definitely do that. Ah! Painting the inside of the glass cabinets! I love that! Thank you!!! The windows trim is Definitely getting painted, either Simply White to match the rest of the trim in the house, or Cloud White to match the cabinets. (The trim around the sink window will touch the cabinets, so I'm thinking maybe the kitchen trim should match the cabinets...what do you think?) Thanks again for your wonderful ideas and kind compliments! :) work_in_progress_08 - Thank you for your advice and vote! I too am a lover of soft colors. I'm strongly leaning towards keeping the kitchen palette light (with the exception of the black, of course). I think we will keep the butcherblock. The black counters are temporary (and budget driven), they are butcherblock that was stained black with india ink and sealed with poly. I want to eventually change them out with soapstone or granite. loribee - Thanks so much for your vote! teresa_nc7 - Thank you for your advice! I will be sure to visit the fabric store before making a final decision on the fabric. Where can I find examples of cottage geometric prints? That sounds intriguing! geokid - Thanks for your vote and that rug is very pretty! It might be a bit too saturated for the kitchen, but I'm going to keep it in mind for the den/living room. :) * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * You are all so wonderful! Thank you again for your terrific ideas and advice! (I am so relieved and grateful to have your help to figure this out!) Some decisions made: 1) We are keeping the butcherblock! 2) I don't think I have the guts to go for the blue backsplash (my apologies to the G lovers!), so it will be green, or....perhaps even white (see below) 3) Green will stay as the main color, and I'll try my best to carefully weave in some blue (plus tiny touches of something in the red/pink family for a bit more warmth) 4) I think we need to go for a wider beadboard or v groove backsplash to balance out the chunky cabinets, instead of the traditional skinny beadboard. Backsplash width example: A great point was made that the white backsplash needed beadboard to get the true feel. I tried to add beadboard below ("try" being the key word!). We will be sure to try Both the green and white in real life before deciding. What do you think? Very rough Beadboard Mockups: If we go with "I" below, I think I'd like to have green beadboard for the butcherblock counter, and paint the back of the glass cabinet blue so the kitchen isn't too white: Thanks again, everyone!! :)

I am involved in a very large IPE deck project in which we have already installed about 50,000 board feet of IPE on 50 new decks and we are about to install another 50,000 board feet. The project is at Lake Tahoe, CA which is at 6,000 ft. altitude and has big sun in the summer and a fair amount of snow in the winter. My question: we have been quite disappointed with the several stains that we have tried over the last two years. They seem to last six months or so. Any suggestions on a process which could give us a good look and maybe last one to two years? All suggestions are welcome. Thanks.

I don't have an answer for you but suggestions of how you might work to an answer. Some paint manufacturers have an app on their website where one can upload a picture of their house and try out different colors. When I tried this before it didn't work perfectly so that I ended up with a gorgeous finish rendering, but it worked enough to get me in the ballpark of understanding what a given color would look like on the house. If the mfg. you're using doesn't have such an app, use another manufactures as if you're working with generic colors. Even if you can't buy samples of the actual product, you could have sample paints mixed up to replicate the same finish colors very inexpensively, and do sample boards that you can view in front of your house, from a distance. I do a lot of visualizing using MS Paint and would experiment with it. If you could get a sample of the applied color that is large enough to see in a photo of your house, you could use the tools in Paint to replicate and hand draw that color into the areas in question. If you place the sample color in front of your house and photograph it with the same camera that you photograph the house with, that would be one way of getting it so that you could use it in Paint.

Oh wow, I am sorry to hear that. They should at least give you a discount if you end up replacing the beam. I would go with smooth cedar if given option over again since the stain on so much more predictable. We are building our house and have rough cedar beam indoor and cedar headers outdoor trim...so I just ordered yet another stain today called light walnut and hope that it works out. Lol... For Exterior cedar I am having an even harder time than my interior cedar beam because they don't offer many samples for exterior stains so have to buy the whole gallon as sample (multiple gallons) ....boooh. :(. I have about 3 weeks before they begin staining mine so we will see. Well I will let you know if I find the one and good luck to you! I'd love to see your finished product.