Oceanna - I just got done reading the thread regarding your split. Our is only slightly different than yours. The window above the door is that 70s bubble glass. I don't like it, but ours is clear bubble glass while all the other neighbors have yellow bubble glass. I feel lucky. We also have side lights on either side of the front door, also clear bubble glass. We painted the interior side of our door sort of a deep plum shade. I liked it at the time but would rather go with a very deep green now. Actually, I want a new front door, but that's another budget item entirely, and I'm not ready to go there yet. When we bought the house, the railings were black wrought iron with little gold splotchy things. The rail separated the stairs from the living room. We needed some of that space for my piano, so DH build a half wall from the living room window wall about half way up. On the entry side of that, we've hung two shelves just made of MDF and painted white. Currently there is NO railing from where that half wall ends to the top of the stairs. I was getting on DH's case to get something built there, but the contractors have suggested waiting until they're done with the kitchen. It will give them more room hauling things up and down the stairs. On that big tall wall over the stairs heading down, we have another MDF shelf that we use for some of my larger doodads. At Christmas, we fill it with greenery and have large glass bowls with ornaments and other Christmas items. Unlike you, our kitchen doorway sits off to the right of the stairs, so when you come up our stairs you come into a wall. Oh, our house appears to be a mirror image of yours! I LOVE what you have down at the bottom of your stairs. We have two boys, ages 12 and 10, and a 100-pound dog. We use that garage door as our main family entrance and exit. For me at this point, I doubt anything nice would stay in that location very long! I'm really looking forward to the kitchen being finished. Not so much looking forward to the process. My moto is to "keep the eye on the prize." I also have a goal of having enough money left over after the kitchen to replace at least the windows on the front of the house. Unfortunately, ours are original windows, single pane, and you can see the gaps when the wind blows. We live in a part of the country where 60 mph winds are normal in the winter - slamming right into the living room window - ugh! Oh, we replaced the light in the entry with a ceiling fan with light fixture. I realize it's entirely too modern for your decor, but it suits ours. Besides, I was pretty intent on getting rid of the huge orange globe that was there when we moved in! Also, the house is not air conditioned, and it can get quite hot here in the summer. The ceiling fan helps move the air around the living room quite a bit. Bonus. So, I don't have any advice for you on the entry. Most people here have really left the entries pretty plain. I would vote for painting the wood part of your half-wall white as well. However, we have spent most of the last five years slowly working on replacing all the "wood" trim in this house with white trim. I put the wood in quotes because it was very, very dark and not good quality wood. I had no guilt painting it! Oh, in the corner by our front door, we have a 3-foot tall stuffed moose dressed for fishing. Not a "real" stuffed moose, more of a teddy-bear stuffed moose. Again, I'm guessing that's not really your style, but frankly we are a bunch of nut jobs in this household, so it suits us. It gives me a smile whenever I walk up and down the stairs, and everyone who enters the house comments on him (his name is Morty). Let us know what you decide to do with your entry!

Swapping gives you so many more choices! It should be less expensive, especially if you leave part of the LR wall. I think that is where you should concentrate, deciding what the wall support footprint will be, then the layout choices will be more clear. I grabbed your planner and played around leaving a portion of the LR wall and a support post since you had one in the original plan. Do you have existing soffits as the plan shows and are they necessary? Unless you have a desire to have the stove on the island, I made room for it on the perimeter. The windows make optimal use of cook space limited. Can windows be relocated? Does something like this work? This post was edited by bbtrix on Thu, May 15, 14 at 19:31

Would you husband be opposed to a tandem garage? With a good architect and builder and of course $$$ you could build on and have a side facing garage. The garage would still fit 4 cars, but just tandem through the new garage into the old garage. They can fill in the current garage door and make it look like it is part of the house and not just a filled in garage door. Remove the old driveway and re-landscape. And your house would not look like all garage.

I would change the siding to a darker gray board and batten. Remove the shutters and paint the window trim, including the bow window, black. Change the front door to a stained wood, along with the garage door and porch railing. Add a modern black light fixture and 4" modern black house numbers stacked vertically to the left of the door. Paint the downspout to match the brick.