Fly, I repainted over the FH W/ the next darker color Baby Turtle. I still love it after 2 yrs.! To answer your question: no I do not have the sky blue ceiling in any room that has obvious color on the walls. Personally I do not care for colored ceilings in rms. w/ colored walls UNLESS there is substantial crown moulding around the ceiling. Especially if the moulding is a white or lighter version of another color. My eye just needs a place to 'rest' between colors. The blue ceiling also serves to tie together all of the downstairs rms. as they all have robin's egg blue accents in them. If there is no substantial moulding or none at all then I like white or cream walls w/ a colored ceiling. I am thinking about painting my DR ceiling (wall color is F&B Green Blue) a nice goldish/tan shade & installing thicker crown moulding. Also considering doing the same thing in our MBR but w/ reversed colors of the DR.

Wow, thank you to so many people for chiming in! I do appreciate it! Deedles: I continue to like #2, too. Boy, I thought almost everything that mattered in the kitchen was already in! The copper appliance covers are the big unsettled element, I guess. Jessica: I like the diamonds, too. (My problem: I like everything!) The difference between the two patterns is very small -- the diamonds are offset from each other in the second one, but stacked in the first.) jmcgowan: I appreciate your support! (I was going to say "your constancy and support," meaning that I appreciate how you are continuing to help, but I guess I had to remove the "constancy" part to allow you to flip-flop! But seriously, the "anti-clown" argument continues to have merit. Melle_Sacto: Oooh, thank you so much for posting your running-bond 4x4s. I appreciate your effort. They really look classy. Examples of this are a bit hard to come by, so it is really nice to see it in a photo. Thanks. gregincal: Thanks, I like these directions, too. I am kinda torn between KISS (with the running bond) and incorporating diamonds to tie in the floor. Hey, maybe your idea of using fewer diamonds may be the right compromise for my situation. Sweeby: Thank you for the positive feedback. I appreciate your comments on the colors, because I am really weak in that department. Happily, I think all my schemes have the cypress downplayed to small doses now. Melissa: What can I say? You are welcome, and Thank you for giving me the inspiration. Also, thank you for the feedback on the alternate designs. On my long list of things to do is to draw up your idea on the same scale as the others. At first I thought I did not need to do that, because I had your picture to go by, but I think I will do it to give a fairer comparison.

YoungDeb-I grew up in Dallas, over by WR lake. My family is still there and it's home. You're very lucky to live there and in such a gorgeous house! I really love your office. I am definitely going to try the tape trick on the cabs. Jakabedy- yours is another kitchen that I've spent much time studying the pictures of. It's so gorgeous, and I love how true it seems to the original feel of your house. I love your range niche, and your bs is gorgeous. Louisiana- join the club on over thinking! I definitely sweat every detail, which most people don't even think about. I think minimal crown is probably ok. It's when you get into the gigantic moldings that it starts to jar with the original style of the home. Laura- is the doors will be solid walnut, you will have to have battens-the ones my cab maker proposed are pictured above. Do a search for slab cabinets on this site-veneer is often the choice of even higher end lines. I am also using semi handmade walnut doors. Scherrs has walnut ones too-both solid and veneer IIRC. Writers block-thank you, yes, I saw that on IF. Their website is not easy to search and seems to crash my browser so I try to minimize how often I visit. But I saw that some had recommended a specific blade, which I will buy. Also going to try to find an as is door for practice. Joanie- thanks for the thoughts on the floor. I think you are right about the white being too high maintenance. I ordered a 12x24 grey tile, so hopefully it doesn't show too much dirt.

Thank Sims Luxury Builders! My DH has agreed to let me choose the sofa color so the first choice is charcoal gray. The problem I am having is we want a sectional and it has to be relatively small (about 100 x 70) with a left side chaise. Ideally we want leather upholstery to stand up to our kids. And...... it needs to be "cool" and not a typical oversized ugly sectional. All of these "conditions" is leaving me with not too many choices unless I get it custom made. I can find black sectionals that fit all of this better than dark gray. Dark gray seems to be mostly fabric and not leather. If I can convince DH to go for hard wearing fabric then that may work. I also have found places to make a custom sofa for me with prices comparable to ready made. DH is a bit leery of this though (quality wise). On another note, our drywall guy has extended his start date twice now. Suppose to start today and now supposed to start Monday. Grrrrrr...