I bought two Munstead Woods, one for a pot, initially, and one for in-ground. Both did well, but predictably, the one in the pot got off to a little better start. Both rebloomed just fine all summer. Again, the one in the pot got a little bigger and had more flowers, but that could be predicted. In the heat, the flower color is not as dark, but that is predictable. My only down observation on Munstead Wood is that the flowers do not last a very long time, especially in the heat. I am not sure that they are any worse than anyone else for blooming time, but you would like them to last longer and, for that matter, be larger than what they are. Then, there is that nice smell. It makes up for some of the shortcomings. Perhaps midday to afternoon shade would be of some benefit, but mine didn't get much. I think Munstead Wood will be a good choice. It looks like its growth habit will be on the sprawly side rather than a more vertical one. Time will tell with these Austin roses, but initially it looks good.

In 2005, I bought a high-end Nordic Track. It worked great until a few months ago, then it would just shut off after a minute or two. Fortunately, I had a maintenance contract on it. They sent a serviceman out--he said the motor went out. He came back to put in a new motor. It still didn't work, so he had to come back two weeks later and replace the motherboard, or whatever it was called. It still shut off. He called the factory. The verdict: the treadmill is on the lower level, where we have ground-fault circuit interrupter (GFCI) outlets. Apparently, you aren't supposed to use treadmills on GFCI outlets. We were flabbergasted. The treadmill worked great for 3+ years. The serviceman said that GFCI outlets should be replaced every few years (ours are 12 years old)! We now plug it into a regular outlet, and it's working fine. You might want to be sure that your treadmill is happy with the outlet it's plugged into....

I have been working on the 4th group and it is looking good. The group name will be Best Friends. Right now it looks like 12 will be in the group which means each person will receive 11 blocks. I will leave it so someone else can join in if they want to before the end of December. It looks like there will be one Jan. birthday and then the next one will not be until March so there will not be a lot to do over the holidays if that is of a concern to someone who is considering joining in. Actually, the birthdays are very nicely spaced. Who would have expected that? LOL I want to send e-mail out to confirm with a few people that they are willing to make 2 blocks or be in 2 groups and then the group will go out by e-mail to the members. I'm so happy this is working out for those who have been waiting for awhile to see if we could form a fourth group! Jeanne (Sorry to have been slow finishing up this last group. My dog is home and doing well. We will not know the results of the biopsy until next week. Obviously, we are spoiling her a lot!)

You have 2' b/w the DW & the side counter...so you'll have plenty of room to stand and unload the DW. As to ovens & DW...how often are they used/open at the same time? Even if you're emptying/loading the DW while baking/roasting I don't think it would be that big a deal to temporarily close the DW while getting something out of the oven. You can check things by looking in from in front of or the side of the DW. The MW is the one that might be an issue as it gets used more (at least in my house!). But, I think it's the same response, close the DW temporarily, if you have to, to get something out of the MW...you might not even have to b/c of the 2' b/w the DW & oven stack and b/c MW doors open to the side...hinges on the left side (which is one reason why I wouldn't do the same thing on the other side of your kitchen). Most kitchens have a few compromises to give the best functionality for what you do the most in the kitchen. If you bake a tremendous amount, then maybe it will be an issue. The UC layout's compromises are (1) the oven being under the counter (which I definitely wouldn't want if I baked/roasted a lot), (2) the location of the Wine Ref & UC oven next to each other, and (3) the less than 36" of aisle space b/w peninsula & refrigerator (even w/a built-in). This layout eliminates all 3 of the above but has the oven stack near the DW...which may or may not be an issue, but even if it is, it's not all the time...just those cases when you're loading/unloading the DW & baking/roasting. (If you're just cleaning up while waiting for something to get done baking/roasting, you'll probably want to close up the DW anyway since you'll be done with it for now....unless someone else is cleaning up!)