I just left the realtor a message explaining that I do not want to show the house on Saturday, that instead I need to talk to her about taking the house off the market due to my husband's health and financial problems. I have asked her to please call me, and I am waiting to hear back from her. Whew, I do feel better now, and I want to thank you all so much for encouraging me to bite the bullet and call the realtor. Also I want to thank you all for the good wishes for our family. My husband is doing fairly well, he has to do another thallium stress test this coming Tuesday. (when they tell you NO caffeine for 24 hours prior to the test, they also mean no DECAF coffee...apparently it has some caffeine in it still, so he had to reschedule his last test) I'll feel a lot better (I hope!!) after we get the results from this stress test, right now I kind of want to just keep him in a happy little decaffeinated stress-free bubble....lol. roselovr, sorry to hear about your husband's trouble with Allied....when they want to cut his pay, how do you fight back? We basically just had to take whatever my DH's employer dished out to us. My DH was originally on an hourly salary, was working a minimim of 20 hours overtime per week since he took his current position (he's had this position now for about 18 months and when they offered this position to him the agreement they worked out was based on a 40+20 guaranteed hour work week...but it was just verbal, not in writing). In mid December my husband got a memo, which started off something like "Due to excessive overtime...." Anyway, the memo outlined his new pay structure which basically took him off of hourly plus OT and put him on a salary. He told them he could not work 60+ hours per week for the salary they were willing to pay him, so he cut his hours down and found a part time job to make up the difference. The week prior to starting his new part time job, he told me he was having severe chest pains. I took him to the ER and they hooked him up to that machine (EKG?) and the alarms were going off, and lights were flashing and people rushing around. He was having a bad arrhythmia with high PVC runs and Vtach, and needed iv meds to stabilize his heartbeat. It was horrible and sitting in the hospital that night I wasn't sure I'd still have a hubby in the morning. Since that night, I have pursuaded my husband to turn down the part time job and I have increased my hours at work to try to make up some of the lost income and take some pressure off of him. We are in the process of reworking our budget to be more mindful of how we spend our money and I'm proud to say that both DH and I quit smoking four weeks ago (that's a savings of $350.00 per month!!). My new motto is "make do". There really wasn't a reason for us to sell our home...it's large enough for us(especially with our 18 year old headed off to college in the fall). We really just wanted to move to a different (translation......"prettier") neighborhood. The last few months have made it crystal clear to me that it's not worth risking your health just because you're ready for a change of scenery when you look out your kitchen window. I'll take my old view and my not-so-old husband!! Sorry for such a long posting! Thanks again to all of you! Jiggreen

#2 does not look high enough in the seat, and the back may be canted more like lounge seating. A hard dining chair is usually about 17-1/2 -18 at the seat. An upholstered one may be closer to 19 if it has firm upholstery. My sofa is about 17, but the way that you sink into it means the table would feel like it is at chin level. So an inch +/- some may not Seem like much but a lot has to do with how hard the deck is on the chair and the firmness of the cushion. Banquettes are generally higher, stiffer and with a shallower seat front to back than a conventional sofa for this reason, and the same goes for fully upholstered chairs. They have to be much stiffer and upright than a similar living room chair to keep you at a comfortable eating position. Federal sofas are pretty shallow but you may have to get a firmer cushion...you won't really know unless you sit there for a couple meals whether it is right or not. There was a nearby restaurant that had chairs that were the slightest bit too low, and banquettes that were a bit too soft, and I noticed that people would sometimes asked to be moved. They were probably less than an inch too short--I think I measured once when I had a tape with me 8c/ -- but eventually they changed the chairs.

CeltinNE-thanks,good luck w/the colors. C-peanut-Thanks, I went to the John B forum, looks very helpfull. Ellendi-thanks for your support. Brickeyee-thanks, I have a very level counter with my level, & I created my center line, plumb. The center line I used to find lines on either side, to line up my points so that my "chevron" would be centered. A 1/4 way up the 30" wall, I discovered another reference line I could use! I did this by placing my 45* triangle on the tiles so I could line up with vertical. And there was an ever so slight tilt. the 90* was still there between the tiles& 45* in relationship to the counter. So I started making adjustments to get it exactly vertical. That was were the problem started. This act appeared to have compounded the adjustments with each row. I had a hunch that, like spokes on a wheel, that as I distanced my work from the tweak I'd made, my work got larger distances in the gaps. My question is this, is it possible to work with the horizontal, vertical at the same time while maintaining the 45* relationship to horizontal & vertical? It seems like I should be able to do this..

Why not? I'd recess the microwave and have shallow cabinets on the pantry side...for canned goods. The balanced cabinet you drew is lovely and I don't understand why it won't work? Couldn't you have one of those swing out doors on the range side, to access that back corner, for extra storage, rather than the lazy susan? I've seen those on the forum several times. I'd be tempted to slide the range wall/window area towards the fridge just a bit, so you'd have fewer uppers on the right side of the windows and a larger upper/hutch storage on the left. You could have a cabinet next to the corner access, for bulky pots and then two sets of drawers to the left of the range. Since you should definitely (LOL) put the stools on two sides of the island, I think it might look better anyway, if the range was over just a bit...and you would have the hutch storage you really want :)