Daisyntn, Oh how I wish I had this information when the Stanley Furniture was still here. I did email Mr. Scheffer the pictures and the link to this site but I got no response. Customer Service at Stanley said once the store gets the furniture they are not involved. But I do want to call Mr. Scheffer when I have some time to remind him what he is doing to his reputation by not caring about what the stores are getting from China that does not seem to be inspected properly. I lost hours and hours an days of work and missed seeing my father before he died due to the furniture fiasco I had to go through due to Stanley Furniture's misrepresentation of the quality of their furniture and the store not inspecting it first before it ever arrived in my home.

Ok, here's my super long reply! The sink is a Kindred, made of granite composite material. It's a dark grey color (WONDERFUL for not showing any spots and most stains). It's 31" long, 18" wide (front to back) and 8" deep, single basin. The dining fixture is centered with the window on the far left wall (where your fireplace is; I've got a side window instead). It's NOT lined up with the window in the "dining room" area - several inches off, actually, but I never noticed until I just got up to check. (And I see that in my floorplan it looks like it's lined up with that window - oops!) The clearances to get past the table to the living room are perfect. Plenty of room on both sides of the table (except during holidays when I put that extra leaf in...then I try to push it toward the front wall so you can easily get around the "back" (hallway side) of the table. The noise with the open plan hasn't been a problem for me at all - I've got a 4-year-old and 19-month-old who are regularly running laps around the room screeching at each other. (Who knew opening up the floorplan like that made for the first real circular running path in the house?) When I'm cooking, if they're in the living room watching TV, I've got the TV as my background noise too. My only issue is the dishwasher. We tend to hit the "delay start" button when company is over or when we're just trying to watch a movie in the evenings. But, we didn't spring for a quiet dishwasher either - it was one we bought in '06 when we moved in and just made it work with the remodeled kitchen. When it's time to replace, I'll look for a panel-ready or stainless model that's got reviews for being extra quiet. Now, for outside, like I said, we've JUST closed it in. No siding or even a real door or windows up yet! The picture I'll post was taken several weeks ago and we've made some progress since then, but with waiting for those materials to arrive and it being a project my husband is doing, it's not exactly fast moving. :-). I'll also show you a picture from a few years ago - the door has ALWAYS been off-center. On to the good stuff - pictures! Here's the pictures from the mostly finished kitchen remodel in May of last year. It's probably the cleanest my house has ever been (the day of my son's christening). Imagine many more toys strewn along walls in the living room and a wooden play kitchen in the dining room now. View from the hutch/fireplace area: View of my island - notice how we raised it on the one end - another great mess hider! Mudroom area we built into the kitchen, given where we really enter the house. The small doors are for a pantry we added. Another reason we raised the island on that one side - for the hidden microwave at a slightly higher height than the traditional under-counter ones. The sink I still drool over. Here's a view from the kitchen out toward the dining and living room. That front door will become a doorway with our new enclosed entry. But it's not moving location at all. The original entry with off-center door: And, I know it's a blurry picture (cell phone) and it's off to the side, but here's the addition as it started to take shape. It now has a small porch (about 3' deep) and steps that line up with the door. The porch is covered entirely by the roof overhang (there will also be columns on each side). On that blank-looking wall, we're putting in a 24" x 24" square window, set up high so the top of the window lines up with the top of the door. It helps balance the off-center door within the addition. We may dormer the attic at some point and we'll do different size/shape ones to balance it out even more, but it really doesn't look too bad now. I wish I had a more recent picture for you - maybe if I remember tomorrow morning since it's dark by the time I'm home from work. We laid out a lot with painters tape on the floor (as much as we could since walls were coming down and we pushed the kitchen out about a foot from where it was). Heck, I even set up pieces of cardboard to test our layouts. I was thinking peninsula too, but hated the idea of doing dishes and having to walk around the peninsula, and then around the dining room table to open the front door. My dad threw out the idea of fridge on the front wall and an island with a totally open wall and we loved it. I never would've thought to do it that way. The pantry/entry/2 seats at the island side keeps guests out of my way when I'm cooking - but they can still linger nearby.

Thank you Bev for giving me the visualization I've been lacking! It really helps! I agree that the colors In the painting have been giving me difficulty. I may try to move it into the DR or another room, but it is quite large, so I'm not sure. In any case, you have helped me feel bolder about getting started on this project. Thank you!! Chucksmom: I I00% agree that if you love something, it doesn't matter if it's "out". In my case, I do think I'm tired of the colors and need a change. Since the whole house needs painting, it seems like a good time to implement these changes. The chandelier was something I really loved for a long time, but I need a aimpler look. I have a friend who wants it and it will be perfect in her DR. Kippy: I've always thought it was strange that the furniture faces the stairs. Maybe it's partly why the room feels weird to me. That and the high ceilings make it feel cold. We actually never use that room other than when there are large gatherings that spill into that part of the house. We all congregate in the FR. Kitchen and backyard, though the cats like to curl up on the sofa!

"I prefer the term 'coastal' to beachy. LOL" Me too! This discussion is of interest to me as we are finishing a gut remodel of our house that we bought as a second home. I decorated fast and inexpensively with a lot of beachy themed stuff from furniture to wall art. Baskets of shells, baskets in general, walls painted shades of fairly intense blue and aqua etc. Lots of beachy Home Goods type artwork for the walls. 5 years later we live here full time and I'm more than ready to switch out from the Margaritaville AirBnB theme decor style. Eld, I love your look and I think you are spot on with your colors, style and decor. Here is more than anyone probably cares to know about how I'm trying to achieve the same blend and mix. I'm going for a coastal modern mix. White shaker cabinets in our kitchen, both bathrooms and office. This is my quartz countertop inthe kitchen and office. Kitchen is getting black bar pulls and black faucet to play off the veining in the counters. Maybe a black simple chandelier over the dining room table which will hopefully be this if it comes back in stock along with some kind of natural fiber chairs. And I'm putting these countertops in the bathroomsalong with a coastal blue/green mosaic shower surround tile with these faucets. Here's the store picture of my new couch, loveseat (didn't buy the chair) and coffee/end tables though I probably won't use all three of the tables together. Our windows have white plantation shutters so the above is similar to what the view looks like above our couch-our windows aren't quite so lavish though. In my house if you are standing at this angle in my living room, to the left are a pair of 12-foot sliders that face the water. So the room is flooded with light all the time. That slider along with 3 other large ones are all getting Hunter Douglas white roller shades, again a simple coastal look with a modern twist. Our new flooring is light wood look tile that's 5 feet long and 12 inches wide-again coastal but with a modern feel, not a wood facsimile. I'll be using some jute area rugs. Using this Benjamin Moore color for the 'public' rooms: kitchen, bathrooms, living room, hallway and office. It reads as a neutral but with a very, very pale blue tinge, enough to make a nice contrast with our trim which is squared off large base and door molding painted white. Bedrooms will be this Sherwin-Williams color which again is a super pale calming hint of green neutral. For art I'm thinking of stealing an idea I saw somewhere and liked a lot: enlarging some vintage family pictures to poster size and framing them with a simple metal or black frame. I've got tons of pictures of parents, kids and my spouse in natural/water settings so I'm hoping that will be a nice way to have a personal touch while keeping things simple. And last but not least I'm leaning toward a couple of Audobon bird prints so I'm right there with you Eld! Flamingo is a no brainer, again large and framed very simply. Probably another tropical/shore bird like a pelican or anhinga. So there you have it and once again Eld your home looks beautiful so go for what you want!