My island is 10 foot long with a sink that back to my rangetop. I never have a problem being butt to butt, we have 48" between and I love it. The thing I wish I could change would be to add a half circle of granite overhang on the edge of the island towards the eating area. We often eat or visit at the island and it's no fun to be cafeteria/counter style. I've actually added a round countertop table to the end of my island so I can sit and see people's faces.

Do you have a specific reason for wanting pullouts instead of drawers? Drawers are better - and generally cost the same. Your configuration has lots of 22" drawers (and cabinets) - but is that the configuration that will best suit your things? Wider drawers are really nice.

The uppers around the range - I would make each of those a single cabinet, with 2 doors, instead of a big and a little. I had 12" uppers in my old kitchen, and they were next to useless.

Is this new construction? I'd like to see more windows in the kitchen - perhaps between counters and uppers?

I like the cabinet next to the ovens opening to the side - great use of space. I have the same thing next to my fridge. Oh, and you have the same at the ends of the island. What do you plan to store in those spaces?

Now is the perfect time to lay out where everything will go in the new kitchen. I inventoried practically everything I owned, and assigned it a home in the new kitchen. Pay particular attention to putting things near their point of use: potholders near stove and oven; cooking utensils, pots and pans near stove; cutting boards near prep area; dishes near the DW. Plan for small appliances, towels, plastic containers, bags and wraps. I like to think in terms of "prime real estate", with most-used items getting the prime locations, and the fancy casserole I use twice a year relegated to a top shelf.

In your laundry room - what is through the door to the bottom? Pocket doors would free up a lot of space, especially if the doors will usually be left open. I might be tempted to put the fridge opposite the W/D, to allow for a long counter.

I would put the DW on the other side of the sink. It is very inconvenient to have it in the prep zone.

Are you open to kitchen design comments?

If you do nothing else, move the DW to the other side of the sink and move them both "down" to give you more prep counterspace where you need it most. You have a lot of wasted counterspace right now...

Amyktexas - good to know I'm not the only one who likes that configuration.

AnnKH - excellent points. I will make changes based on your comments. On the lower cabinets near the ends of the front kitchen elevation, I will divide that block in 2 instead of 3. This way I will have one 18 inch door/drawer cabinet, and one 18 inch 4-drawer cabinet on each side. What do you think?

The tall cabinet on the side of the ovens will be for larger items and an appliance garage for the items I don't use on the counter on a daily basis. The doors on the side of the island in front of the ovens will be for cookbooks, and prized family recipes. The other end of the island, on the side near the fridge and kitchen table will be for kid cups and snacks, so the kids can have easy access to them.

I totally intend to store the items near the place they will be used. I did that in my old kitchen as well. Life saver!

The uppers around the cooktop: they told me it would be too tall of a cabinet if I do just one door, because I have 10'1" ceilings. I have a lot of glass vases and jars that I rarely use, mainly for parties, that would fit nicely up there. They take up prime real estate in my current kitchen.

The kitchen will actually be very bright, because of the 5 windows in the breakfast area, and that window in the corner. We also have 2 more in the piano gallery next to the breakfast area. All those windows (except kitchen window) are nearly floor to ceiling.

Laundry: the door on the bottom is to the single car garage, which will be mostly used on grocery days for unloading, and that door will be closed most of the time. No real through traffic there.

Funkycamper and buehl - my idea for the dishwasher on that side was because it was the side nearest the breakfast table, and between the dishwasher and the trash pull out, I thought it would be best to have the dishwasher near the breakfast area. But I do see how it would be interesting to have it the other way around.

If this room is only 8'10" wide you do not have enough space for an island you should have 36" on both side of an island and beyween the counters...they have cleverly not put in the relevant measurements, you must want an island and they want the job and don't want to disappoint....this will not be pleasant

For sure it is 48 inches between the stove and the island. The width of the room is not 8' 10". It's over 12'. That 8'10" is some other measurement relating to the windows. They have that number near every window.

Then it is not to scale...same problem

Just to clarify, the lines with the measurements on either side of the cooktop are not where the counters end, that's the measurement line. The counter line is by the word "cooktop". I don't see how the floor plan is not to scale. Honestly, it looks to scale to me. Anybody else thinking it's not to scale?

If the DW is to the left of the sink, you can't do prep and clean-up at the same time without congestion and annoyance. If someone is prepping, they will have to move out of the way for someone else to access the DW. If the DW is to the right of the sink, someone can prep on the left side while someone else loads/unloads the DW without being in each other's way.

houserookie, I wasn't talking about the stacked cabinets - I was referring to the three doors on each side, where you have a 13-1/4" cab next to a 27-1/2" cab. I would much rather have a 40" cabinet with two doors, since my experience with 12"-wide cabinets is that they are a pain to use.

AnnKH - Ah!!! I see! Hum..... You are changing the look of my kitchen! Hahahahahahaha that's wonderful! You are totally right. I was measuring my cabinets in my old kitchen, and the smallest double cabinet I have is 30 in. I even have a larger one that I absolutely love!

Off to make markings all over that paper....

The 8'10 number is probably the height of the window. I just used the length of the island as a guide, and you've got ~9' from the wall to the far side of the island. 2' for the perimeter, and 2' of island cabinets, and you've got 5' left. That means if you've got a 4' aisle, you've only got a 12" overhang, which it looks like they've drawn more. 12" is fine for me, but I know it's derided here. But then I haven't accounted for counter overhangs, so you might even have less than a 12" overhang, or less than 48" of aisle.

Again, fine for ME, but not the GW approved minimums.

I'm going to check the actual blue print with the builder, and double check the measurements. At one point I did check with them the distance between the front cabinets and the island, and it was 48". That I am 100% sure. The distance between the side wall and the island is even bigger than that. I will let you know.

Something is definitely wrong with the cabinet width measurements! Will schedule a meeting with them to talk about it! #partiallyfreakingout

Our last kitchen was very similar to your plan. Our DW was to the right of the sink and it worked out well. I don't think to the left of the sink is a good idea. Attached is photo and the plan.

While I wait to hear back from the cabinet maker with the correct measurements of each cabinet, I went with the outside measurements for an overall idea, and changed the bottom cabinets based on your feed back. They are almos all drawers. Also, I labeled the "prime" areas, where things will be stored.

On the floor plan, I mapped out the work areas. I know a lot of you suggested that I switch the dishwater with the trash pull out. But that may create a conflict with the other zones. The way it is now, the zones in the beginning of the meal preparation don't interfere with the ones that will be used towards the end. So the crossing of those zones should not be a problem. None that I can see, anyway. I'm very open to your comments and experience!

WORK ZONE

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KITCHEN - FRONT

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KITCHEN - SIDE

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ISLAND

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Warning! Wine-induced rant ahead. (After sober reflection I realize I was a bit harsh but my sentiments about the DW placement are still accurate so I won't edit my comments. Just felt I should provide fair warning.)

I think I mentioned this to you previously but I'll state it again, more emphatically, because it seems to need repeating. I currently have my DW in the prep area. I hate it. HATE!! Red-hot passion hate. Justtoday, DH was trying to be helpful and unload the DW while I was making lunch. I finally had to thank him and ask him to get out of the way. So, yeah, I ended up doing the dishes myself later. I don't particularly like doing dishes but I'd rather do that not have someone working in the prep space when I'm cooking. Ugh! It is one of the prime reasons for our remodel (OK, ugly 45 year old cabinets, too, but that damn DW is right up there tied with the uglies!). I am not the only one who has come to GW wanting to remodel because of bad DW placement. IMHO, you are choosing to put your DW in the worst possible location in your kitchen.

If you have a nice wide aisle, like 54-60", someone can plate while someone else is loading the DW. However, there is no way that someone can move from fridge to prep area/sink and prepare food while someone is unloading/loading the DW. Not where you are placing it and no matter how wide your aisles are. It's not gonna work well.

Also, once my DW is out of the prep space, I will be able to leave it open while prepping a meal. This will allow me to move things like mixing bowls, cutting boards, beaters, whisks, spoons, colanders, whatever I've been using to prep with directly into the DW without having to continually open/close the DW door. I lust for this more than I lust for George Clooney.

I am a "clean as I cook" cook. I still do that now with my crappy DW placement but I'm continually opening and closing that DW door OR I leave it open but have to remember to walk around it when I need to use the sink. Both get annoying fast if there is a lot of back-and-forth to the sink needed. When it is moved, I expect not only will my kitchen stay cleaner while cooking but those annoying issues will disappear.

I like to cook. So it is annoying to have an annoyance like bad DW placement detract from the joy I get from cooking.

And, yes, I'm the self-appointed DW Nazi. :)

I've got to go with Funky on this one (I say that a lot). Your primary prep zone is between fridge, sink, and stove - in your case, to the left of the sink, right where you have the DW.

In our house, we often run the DW in the morning when we leave for work, so we have a load to put away when we get home. I often put away dishes while he's cooking dinner - something I absolutely could not do if the DW was in the middle of his prep space.

Flip your pots, pans and prep bowls with the dishes, and you successfully separate your prep and cleanup zones.

Nice job figuring out where things will go!

I appreciate all you comments! My current kitchen has the dishwasher in this location, and it has worked well for the way we cook. But I am seriously considering your suggestions! I really am! :) I changed half the kitchen already based on y'all's comments.

While we are at this, I need to ask a question. Is soft closing doors and drawers really worth it?

They priced it for the entire house. But it is $$$. Wondering if I can get a way with just putting it in the kitchen. Opinions?

Yes, love the soft close doors and drawers are worth it. We have it in current home and made it our priority in the new build- executive cabinets.

R2d2indy -do you have it in the entire house, or just the kitchen?

Kitchen and Master Bathroom in the current home and in new home all areas with cabinets we asked for it.

Once you get used to the soft close in the kitchen only, you might end up slamming all the other cabinets in the house. And, it is not like it takes much force either.

I have the soft close in my new kitchen and LOVE it. Now when I go to my mom's kitchen w/o the soft close, for the first few minutes, I scare myself and the dog with all the banging.

Echo funkycamper's DW rant. Lol!

Yes to soft-close everywhere! And I'd move the DW, too, and I'm not as fussy about that as some people are, but this looks like it would always be in the way. (Our DW is between our fridge and sink, but that doesn't bother me because we get all the stuff out to prep at once and don't clean up until later.)

Doing the soft close everywhere is very tempting..... It sure is pricy tho.

I am giving serious thoughts to all your suggestions. So I wanted to compare the traffic with the DW on the left and on the right of the sink. Tell me what you think.

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Are you planning on going to the pantry for all of your non-refrigerated food? If you moved some of your food storage into the kitchen, it would mean less walking and less crossing over the task-related pathways. Since most of the clean-up will occur after meals, you should have minimal traffic congestion with this layout.

Funkycamper, I never thought of putting food in the kitchen cabinets!

Those cabinets had items related to setting the table and glassware, etc, so people can get in and out of there without coming in my food prep zone.

In our family, it's more likely to have someone setting the table while I'm cooking than to have someone emptying the dishwasher in that time.

You are giving s lot to think about! So much so, last night I had a dream the kitchen was being put in, and it was all wrong! Wrong cabinet style, wrong color, wrong cabinet configuration! And then I was discussing (in the dream) with my mom, about the placement of the dishwasher. Hahahahahahahaha! Freaked me out when I woke up. Took me a couple of seconds to realize it was all a dream...

That will likely be the first of many dreams about this project until it's complete!! I had them all the time :)

Lol houserookie! The dream means you are no longer a rookie. You are a full fledged TKO gardenwebber now. Oh we are so proud of you!

Yes, welcome to TKO (Truly Kitchen Obsessed). A syndrome for which most of us seek no cure!

If it was my kitchen, I would put do one of two things to resolve the table-setting issue:

(1) Put all regularly used serving dishes, plates, cutlery in the cabinets between double-ovens and range. People setting the table can walk around the outside of the island to that storage area without walking actually through the work zones.

(2) Flip your kitchen so table-setting items are closest to the table area. This would mean moving the DW back to the left of the sink. But to make sense for prepping, this would also mean moving your fridge to where the DO's are. My oven is my least used appliance so this wouldn't be an issue for me. This would put dish storage to the right of the cooktop, when facing it, and your food pantry between cooktop and refrigerator. Yes, this would move your fridge farther from the seating area so people would have to walk a bit farther for drinks, snacks, and condiments but they could access it without walking through your work area so it would still work, imho.

A couple other points/questions:

I'm really not convinced your kitchen is big enough for double-ovens. Do you really need that second oven often? Would you be better served by having a range? There are now ranges with two ovens. In your space, I would really prefer having a range....again, if it was my kitchen. You would have more storage options and it would also make your kitchen so much more open. Especially if you move your fridge to where the current DO's are.

One of the things I'm going to reward myself with when my own remodeling project is done is a second small oven, one of the Breville counter-top ovens. I will be putting this in my laundry/pantry room. If you don't need the second oven very often, you might consider putting something like that in your butler's pantry? I dunno. I know some people use ovens more than I do. It seems most of our meals are cooked on the stove and not the oven. So this may not work for you but I think it's something you should at least consider. I've just never been one to understand the appeal of the double ovens taking up so much kitchen space. They only make sense to me in really big kitchens.

Do you need to store all your kitchen dishes and serving pieces together? I find that I only use a couple of serving bowls/trays on a regular basis. These are stored in my kitchen. Everything else is stored in the pantry. I can't see wasting precious kitchen storage on serving items that are only used once in awhile. If it's not used at least weekly, into the pantry it goes.

Regarding a smaller food pantry in the kitchen. There are items I tend to use very frequently and it would irk me if I had to go into the pantry each time I wanted them. I keep all my seasonings and oils in lower-storage next to my range. I keep them low so the rising heat doesn't degrade them. Of course, your food items may be different than the ones I'm mentioning but I do a lot of different types of stir-fries using couscous, quinoa, different rices, bulgur, etc. I also use a fair amount of dried or canned beans. In my kitchen, I keep mason jars or cans of these items handy. The excess is stored in the pantry. So I might only have one or two cans of black beans in the kitchen but the other 10 I bought on sale would be in the pantry. I might have bought 5# of quinoa from the bin at the market but only a pound might fit in my kitchen mason jar. The rest goes in a container in my pantry.

This is very convenient and makes dinner prep quicker for me. I also tend to use these items more often. I'm really bad about forgetting to use something if I'm not looking at it so I might forget I even have quinoa or black beans if I don't have a smaller stash of it in the kitchen.

I don't know if any of this is helpful at all or if I'm just rambling. Take what makes sense to you and leave the rest. :)

The answer to every problem you have is to switch the fridge and
microwave stack. It will greatly improve flow. This would move
your prep area to the other counter run, which is wasted now. Drop a
prep-sink in the corner there and you can leave your dishwasher where
you have it. Plates, silverware in the cabinets between the oven / cooktop.

Clean up is separated from prep, and you'll reduce your traffic through the kitchen tremendously by routing snackers around the outside of the island.

You can keep your food in the actual pantry.

The (small) run of counters between the cooktop and microwave / oven stack then is great for setting hot things down (landing space).

Funkycamper- I'm loving your ideas! Those aren't real double ovens, they are an oven on the bottom and a microwave. Now I'm curious to understand why those would not fit in that corner. I might start having dreams about that too. LOL Actually, in last night's dream, there weren't any ovens at all! Goodness.....

Johnsoro and Rebunky, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one with these crazy scary dreams! :) You made me feel like I belong.... :)

You do belong, house-no-longer-a-rookie! LOL

I don't have time to do mock-up some floorplans for you but I think you should do some floorplans with the various ideas presented including MamaRachel's above. I like what you did with drawing the traffic lines because I always suggest that people do pretend cooking in their plans before committing to a space. And consider as many scenarios as possible. I think it's a more real exercise if you can do it with real people in a mock-up of your space. I moved furniture like a buffet that pretended to be my clean-up peninsula and such. I drove my husband crazy with mock cooking sessions, lol. I would have us do things like pretending he was cleaning-up while I was making stir-fry, or he was making chili while I was baking, or I was making a big salad while he was making sandwiches while we were both tending to the big pot of home-made soup, yada yada. I just tried to come up with any reasonable scenario we might encounter to help identify best what worked and what didn't. When a 3rd or 4th person was around, I would involve them by asking to pretend they were making a snack while we prepared different parts of dinner and such. It really helped me ID what worked best for us in most situations.

I'm glad you like my ideas but, at the same time, what works for me may not work for you. But there are certain rules that we should strive to follow that have been proven for good kitchen design. Try googling The 31 Rules of Kitchen Design. The Starcraft website has an excellent explanation of these but you can also find it elsewhere. If you read up on those, some of the suggestions you're getting from all of us might make more sense to you. Best wishes.

I was just thinking about your kitchen. Glad you liked funky's idea of moving the fridge to where the oven is, I think that will fix the dw dilemma!

If you are open to it, I had this crazy thought to add to the mix of your dream (nightmare?) scenarios. Lol!

I don't know if or how this would function because I've never had a separate wall oven or known anyone with the set up I am going to suggest. Oh well, I'm just going to throw it out anyways and see what you and others think. :-)

I was thinking, what if you put both the fridge and the oven/micro on that side closer to the pantry next to one another? You might have to make sure your fridge hidged away from the oven, or do something to make it so that if the oven door was open someone (not thinking) wouldn't accidentally fling the fridge door open and crunch the door. Like if you had a French door. Maybe you need side swing oven? Idk, but I am sure I have seen this set up many times on houzz with a French door fridge. They must not be a total no-no, huh?

One reason I liked this idea was I thought in the space where you had the fridge, you could add another window flanking the right side of your cooktop to balance with the one on the left. I love that look!

You could extend the countertop under the window to be about the same distance on each side of the ct. Then make the two windows a bit wider to match the width of the ones in the breakfast room.

You could make the island a little longer too if you wanted. The sink could stay centered to the range. Or you could move the sink down more so it is not back to back with range and more prep space on the right. But I am thinking you liked it centered.

This puts your microwave close to the fridge instead of on opposite ends. I find this more convenient to keep the crossing through the kitchen to a minimum.

The baking center is still near the oven. You'd still have a ton of counter space before getting close to the range. Even if you added a prep sink like mama Rachel suggested you still have lots of counter space.

Some might think you should have some big appliances or pantry on each ends of an L shaped kitchen so one side doesn't look heavy. However, I think the flanking windows would visually balance that longer wall very nicely, imho. Especially since on that short wall the upper cabinets are ended at the corner. Anyways, just my crazy thought. Hope it doesn't haunt your dreams!!!

Edit: Here's a couple I quickly found on houzz, not the best examples but gives an idea.

I like that idea, rebunky!

Wow, you guys come up with ideas that never even crossed my mind. Off to think about this now. I will have to involve DH, since he cooks as well.

My old kitchen (we are selling, listed today!) probably is in violation of a few of the kitchen design rules. The fridge is on the left side of the dishwasher, across from the passageway to the breakfast area. The island blocks the path from from the fridge to the stove. Fairly good size medium kitchen, 15 x 13 ish, not including the attached breakfast area. The interesting thing is that this arrangement never really bugged me. I think it would drive some of you insane. I'm actually very flexible when it comes to food prep. Cabinet design/configuration bugs me more. The things that bothered me the most was the placement of the fridge next to a wall, and the white laminate countertops. And also the vynil floors, but we recently changed those to a nice wood laminate.

We are in the very beginning stages of building a new home, and in the mean time we are staying at a tiny townhouse, with a tiny kitchen that probably breaks ALL the design rules, with all 3 major appliances opening up against each other in a small U, narrow distance between counters, just to name a few... So whatever my next kitchen end up looking like, it will feel like giant leap...

As far as dreams go, last night I had a dream where I had renovated my old kitchen with cream uppers and black lower cabinets, and my agent wanted to list the house for half the value. I was having a fit and a heated discussion with my agent and DH, when thank Goodness I woke up. But I was confused for the first couple of seconds. Oh my.

Your dreams are hysterical.

My parent's kitchen had a horrible layout. Thus, I also had a few kitchens with bad layouts and didn't realize it. My previous kitchen remodel and the one I'm currently doing have good, functional layouts. Once you experience how much quicker and easier prep/cook/clean-up are with a good layout, you will never want to go back to a bad one.

I think it's very possible to give you both good function AND good cabinet design/configuration. So dream about working in a kitchen that gives you both! :)

Second guessing adding to the island length. I just realized you were at 9' already. It might mean adding a seam and more cost to make it any longer. Just thought I better FYI that.

Funky, thanks for liking my crazy idea. I'm a real ametuer at this so figured I'd learn something and get a unanimous thumbs down! Haha!

Well, it looks good in the photos and should keep the kitchen functional. I don't know why anybody would give it a thumbs down. Although I'm a still-learning amateur myself Shhhh...let's not scare anybody. :)

You guys.... So my husband is the one with thumbs down. Hahahahahahahahahah he hates the idea of having the fridge and the ovens next to each other.

So I spent the whole day thinking about all the advice you guys gave me. But also had to be honest with myself, and think how we actually cook and clean. Then I started thinking that not all meals are created equal in the Rookie household. I thought long and hard about this. And being the OCD that I am, I drew patterns again. Couldn't do a mock because my temporary residence is too small. Not enough length anywhere. So I had to imagine and think about previous experiences.

The way we prep, there is a lot of back and forth to the trash. WAY more than opening the DW during prep. So realistically, I may leave the trash pullout halfway open during prep.

Emptying the DW happens either before prep or after meals, or if I have something in the oven, or stove that will take a longer cooking/baking time. But never during prep.

Breakfast time is a fast and furious event at our house. I'm normally rushing everyone, otherwise they think it's the weekend and they can carry on a conversation without any concern for time. It will be more efficient to have the kids sit at the island, and have a mini pantry with the few non perishables nearby. This way I will concentrate activities around one area, and still have easy access to the trash.

Dinner time is a more relaxed time. I normally gather all my ingredients first. Then prep. Not a lot if back and forth to the fridge and pantry. So if I move the dinner prep zone to the side of the island, I will have easy access to all related items as well as the baking zone. And easy access to the trash.

For some reason, I realized how much I use the trash during prep. I went through the meals I prepare, step by step, you know, and there it was, popping up as a sore thumb every other task. My current (and previous) kitchen has a trash can in plain site. Yuk. Awful, but very practical.

Cleaning time: as I said, this is never done during prep in my house. So I tried to think about the items that I will be putting away, their size, quantity, etc. for example: a typical load will have about 40 thousand cups and 50 million silverware pieces, but only one large bakeware, 3 pots and pans, and a few cooking utensils. I figured it would be easier to keep the items that are more prevalent in the load closer to the dishwasher. This means fewer trips far from DW. With the DW on the right, and with its door open, it will block the putting away path to half the cabinets. With the DW on the left, it will provide a more clear path to all cabinets.

Setting the table and easy acces to plates, cups, and such without coming in the main cooking zone will also make things flow smoother.

I realize most of you recommended the DW on the right. And I do see the point, and wisdom in that. But the more I think about how our family functions, the more I'm convinced that it needs to stay on the left. But I did consider all your advice, believe me. So much so, I changed the lowers to mostly drawers, and added a space for a mini pantry near the fridge.

I'm still open to suggestions and opinions. I do not claim to be an expert on kitchen design. Just a hopeless OCD person trying to build my perfect forever home. ;)

Here are the patterns:

BREAKFAST PATTERN

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DINNER PATTERN

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DISHWASHER PATTERN (PUTTING AWAY)

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Oh dang! My idea went KaaaaaaaaaBooooom! Hahahaha! No worries, rookies' husband. :-)

But you're in serious trouble when funky chimes in! If she starts the post with "Warning wine induced rant ahead!" Watch out. Lol....just kidding funky! Your the best.

I seriously commend you for walking through each and every meal prep and clean up step by step, to see what works best for YOU.

What about just the fridge to ovens flip with dw on left? That was a no go too?

I know Funky is not going to like it...... Funky you are great, and we still love you! Actually, all of you are great. You all have so many wonderful ideas!!!!!!!

My concern about switching the oven with the fridge has to do with a safety concern. My kids are little still, and the oven there will right in the more frequently used path for them, from the table to where I will be standing. And to the family room. With nothing in front of it for protection. I'm afraid of when I have the oven door open and am getting piping hot things out of it.

DH has a scar on his head to this day from when he was a kid, from running into an open oven door.

This kitchen planning business is a scientific jigsaw puzzle!

This kitchen planning business is a scientific jigsaw puzzle!

LOL, exactly! I won't go on a DW rant. Too early for wine. :)

I think one of the most important things we need to do when planning a kitchen is exactly what you are doing, houserookie. We need to pretend cook, prep, clean, put away, as many scenarios as possible to reflect the way we really live. And we all do these things a bit differently. There are universal guidelines that tend to work the best for the most people but there are always unique circumstances where these guidelines may not work the best for that particular space or family.

I might go on a rant about the DW as the self-appointed DW Nazi if you were placing the DW willy-nilly without any regard for how you live and ignoring advice without having a good reason for doing so. But you clearly aren't doing that.

I suggest you do this pretend cooking/cleaning-up a bit more. Think about what might change when your kids are older and are of an age where they can start helping in the kitchen. They don't stay small forever even though it sometimes feels that way, lol. Will you want them to help with clean-up? If so, will it be during meals or just after meals? I'm sure you will want them to learn to cook at some point. What tasks will you give them at different ages and where will they work to do these tasks where they can be monitored while working alongside you as you prepare other parts of the meal?

Doing this might alert you to changes you need to make to keep your kitchen layout the right one for you as they get older. Or, maybe not.

Just another thought, if you get a 24" trash cabinet, it would be very easy to switch trash location with DW location in the future if you decide it's necessary. The plumbing lines from sink to DW are very easy to switch already so no need to plan for that. You might consider having an extra electrical line placed behind your trash cabinet for this "just in case" scenario. While wiring for a kitchen, the cost of a wire to that location will be virtually nothing more. It would cost much more to do it later.

I think you've put a lot of good thought into your plan so no rant from me today. Let us know if you need further help and, of course, please come back here when your kitchen is done to share photos of your completed kitchen. We LOVE reveals. :)

Funkycamper - Thank you for your encouragement and ideas! Yes, the trash pullout is a 24 inch, and there is an outlet on each side of the island, on the false panels, facing the inside of the kitchen. So electricals are in place. This piece of information made me feel better! You know, knowing that I could swap them in the future if our routine changes. Maybe this will be when straight granite or Quartz is no longer a desirable surface, and will be the time to change to whatever new "steel-diamond" alloy solid surface that technology will have created at the time. :P

You need to move the dishwasher to the other side of the sink and put the trash, where you have the dishwasher.

If you don't want to do that....remember, we gave you fair warning :)

Rebunky, you are hilarious!!!!!!

Lavender_lass, I stand warned! :)

I had planned for the kid snacks to be by the fridge on the side of the island facing the kitchen table.

If trying to figure what will work best for us in this kitchen configuration wasn't enough, I'm still struggling with the issue of soft closing doors/drawers. Yes/no, kitchen only/kitchen and master/whole house......

Goodness. This way I will be hospitalized at the end of this process, and won't even get to enjoy the kitchen..... :P