How brazen! I hate horse thieves! It coulda been worse...he could have taken your 'purse'! Thankfully, you're OK...and mebbe he'll choke on the spagh...hehehe... Why don't people just GET A JOB!!! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.............

now i have a serious ? for ya, is she on the same page with ya as far as her family is concerned?? i know when it comes to me and my family sometimes my hubs and i arent on the same page and at home we are, i think our pages seem to get mixed up somewhere. he has this new job and can come off as very controlling, his job is a prison guard so he brings it home, i also happen to be a controlling person, when it comes to things i want, (i'm getting to it, LOL) like here, i want to keep the ac off, he wants it on, so he can sleep in the days (he works nights), i like the lower bills AND the idea of how the less energy used. he wants the dryer fixed, i'm happy using the washer only, and hanging the clothes. i know where i can get a dryer that works for 50. don't want it cuz its still cheaper on bills and less energy wasted. we are not on the same page BUT he kinda lets me do my thing. and he knows i want to go green, and is letting me, SLOWLY even though he likes to be very comfortable, sorta. i homeschool and the kids decided that part of it is to go and recycle and learn all they can about it and keep doing that, they want to "go green" so my son tabor (12) made me a compost pile, ummmm getting back to the other thing,, LOL is she on the same page?? i'd totally be ticked if my family members did that, inlaws or not, if i made breakfast!! i can see where you'd be irritated. i think i would too. but look on the bright side, or i like to always try to look at the good part, its annoying that they dont follow your rules, BUT as tom said, you do get to visit them, so you could just go ahead and look at it as a weird quirk of theirs or something. instead of them being rude and disrespectful. kinda like the glass half full instead of half empty! LOL i try to do that. very hard at times. LOL :')) Medo Good luck

LOL @fori! So glad my angst is providing inspiration for someone. Seriously! At the least, "Don'ts" provide cautionary tales for people to learn from. Sometimes even in fairytale form. :) Yes, my aunt's place is in Florida, so palms are a bit more suited there. It is interesting to note, though, that her palms are actually potted out on her patio, not in the ground. I wish I had current pics of the backyard, but oh well. It gives the idea, just think cedar wood tones instead of redwood and orange. Add an arbor and a big yellow structure. You are almost there. lol I did some checking earlier on code for outlet heights and spacing, but I think I might have just looked at national code. I suppose I should add that to my list of things to confirm pre-header. Gads, this is so backwards! *swoon* My original designs were going for that tall wall of storage with fridge, pantry and perhaps a microwave in the mix, but the dimensions ended up being really tight AND it made working with that corner of the L even more tricky. I really do love that look and envy those of you who are lucky enough to have it. I'm just not sure it's made for people with small kitchens like mine! It means having all of those other appliances crammed on one wall - or going back to a sink or stove on the small island. And now that we are looking more and more at having the fridge or the pantry on the far left of the exterior run and I'm open to putting in pantry in the DR area, I'm just not sure it's the way to go. I do like the stove having its own wall and how the latest options do open up the L with counter space. There's so many ways to go here. Hopefully that means I'll be happy with the option we eventually choose. It is just so incredibly difficult to lock in on the BS window location and height with all of these unknowns. I keep telling myself that pushing it into that corner will not lock me in and I'll have lots of options left if I want to tweak. Right now, it's the BS window height that is giving me fits. How the heck I can lock in on that when we don't even have any material decisions made, I don't know. This is dicier than I think is prudent, but I can't seem to stop this train. That window is going in. Soon. And I'm going to need luck + clarity or magic blue pills. I have these images of me being back 3 months from now, posting to GW about how the heck to make (fill in the blank) work given the window. :D

Coniferous forests always make me think of ticks. Hiding. Lurking. Just waiting to give you some disease. See guys, I'm not friendly to ALL arachnids; that's gotta be something, right?