Yeah, no problem this time of year where you want folks to enter. That is one thing that most people and architects don't think to much about, taking in conideration the prevailing winds when placing the house on the site.

We have LG FD CD fridge, model LG LFC21776ST. Note that this does NOT have ice/water through the door, a specific requirement of mine. It has an icemaker in the bottom freezer which (touch wood) works perfectly. We were limited to this size because of the cabinetry in our kitchen. I originally thought the fridge was way too small, but so far I'm very happy. It's superquiet and efficient, everything is in sight, the lighting, drawers and shelf arrangements work well for us. When it was delivered DH was concerned that it was taking so long to get the temperature down so we called LG's customer service. They had a repairman at our house within a day. He told us everything was operating normally, and the fridge was slow because it's a high-efficiency appliance. Other than this, we have no complaints in about 10 months of use. Cheryl

Overall I like it a lot! Other than the door conflict issues, my only concern is that you might find it difficult to get large pieces of furniture down the rather twisty hallway to the bedrooms. You also need a bit more space at the bottom of the staircase. I understand that the bumpout and closet are there to help define the Great Room space but I think you might do better to make the bumpout only half as deep and get rid of the little closet entirely. If you did that, you could hang a large mirror hung on the wall where the closet door is now that would reflect the stairs and you could put a small bookcase or a narrow table with a vase of flowers below the mirror to create a lovely "focal point" at the bottom of the stairs. Then, on the hallwayside instead of a tight corner, you would have a nice wide space to move furniture around. And, when you're not moving furniture down the hall, you'd have a niche where you could put a family bulletin board or the house telephone, or a wall of pegs for family jackets and bookbags. Just an idea. As for door conflicts and other door issues, here's what I would do to address them. (This thread had gotten pretty long so I admit I didn't read thru all of the comments so others may already have made some of these suggestions) 1) Masterbathroom/closet conflict. Lose that conflicting closet door entirely and instead put an opening between the two closets so one door serves them both. You wouldn't lose any useful space and the change would probably actually make the smaller closet MORE useful because you wouldn't have to walk around the closet door to get to clothing hanging on the east wall. 2) Your masterbath toilet room really isn't large enough for the door to open inward. I'd either open that door outward or consider using a pocket door there. Or you could use a bifold door there. It could probably open either inward or outward. (BTW, this isn't a door issue but while I'm talking about the masterbath, I'd also suggest moving the sink that is closest to the bathroom door about 4 inches closer to the other sink and then cutting about 3 inches off the corner of the bathroom vanity (so the vanity a 45 degree angle)...especially if you're planning on granite countertops! Don't know about you but I am a born klutz, especially in the early mornings when I'm only half awake - and I would bruise my hip on that 90 degree corner on a DAILY basis. You will never miss the lost couple of inches of space between the two sinks - but if you or your spouse are at all klutzy, your hips will thank you for easing off that corner. 3)Southwest bedroom/closet door. Incorporate about 18 to 20 inches of the hallway (right up to the bathroom door opening) INTO the southwest bedroom to create an entry alcove for the bedroom door. I think you can steal just enough hallway space for the alcove so that when the bedroom door is open it will clear the opened bifold closet door. 4) Bathroom/bathcloset. Instead of a closet, consider using open shelving or cabinetry such as one would put in a kitchen. You might actually get more useable storage in the space if you didn't have 4" taken up with the front wall of the closet. And, if someone left a cabinet door open, it would just bump closed when you opened the bathroom door instead of blocking the door the way a bifold closet door might. 5) Pantry/laundryroom doors. Shift the pantry closet to the southwest corner of the area (where the door to the garage is now) and bump about four feet of just that westermost section of garage wall out into the garage about one foot. You'll actually have more useable garage space because the wall won't come out as far into the garage as the door does now. Then, move the door to the garage the so that it sits between the pantry and closet in an alcove that is BUMPED INWARD so that it is even with the edge of the panty. That way the garage door will no longer jut out into the garage. Okay, I'm struggling to describe what I mean and realize that my description isn't at all clear.... Guess I'd better just take the time to sketch it out for you. Without seeing the second floor plan, it is impossible to tell whether your great room has a vaulted ceiling (and thus the possibility of having some clerestory windows over the roof of the covered porch. If you don't have clerestory windows, I think you may find your great room a bit dark - surrounded as it is by the deep covered porch. You might want to look into putting some sky lights or a couple of those "light tubes" (solatubes?) into the covered porch roof. I personally don't like skylights because where I live (central Texas) they admit WAY too much heat along with the light. I understand that light tubes don't admit so much heat and if you could position about three of them so that they throw light right over your patio doors, that would definitely help brighten your great room. Hope some of this is helpful and best wishes with your building project!

I just subscribed to your blog! We're going to start our build soon so it'll be nice to follow it to see your progress. I like it! Here are some photos I've saved to my Pinterest folder. They may give you some ideas? This is kind of the ultimate beachy craftsman house to me and (a lot of people in the blogosphere apparently): Here's another example with more privacy on the sidelights. You could easily envision this with a transom above: This appears to be the same door as the one in the beachy/craftsman house above but without the transom and sidelights. I think you could alter the surrounding treatments in many ways: Here is a variation on a traditional door that contains a mail slot. It has the transom above. But you could add sidelights to it: A traditional door with a mail slot with a transom. I can imagine it with sidelights: An inside view but this looks nice: You could do something like this where the mail slot will fit nicely down low in between the squares: I really do like the top option the best (though the slot would just be inserted on the door and not between anything I suppose) and think with divided lights it would work great too. I'm thinking about a similar door for our home. You could do any of the doors in a deep charcoal gray, black or stained...