"BTW - history completely contradicts your belief in soil testing. Almost nobody gets soil tests now and they weren't even available to homeowners until recently. Like a lot of modern technology, it can be a useful tool. However, people got along just fine without them in the not to distant past." What does that even mean? History contradicts your belief in soil testing? How does history contradict a belief in soil testing? That sentence is an example of making up something that sounds intelligent but has no basis in fact. Soil testing is an extremely important part of all the crops growing in this country. If we had a better understanding of soil science earlier in the 20th century then the dust bowl probably wouldn't have happened, or at least it wouldn't have been so bad. Turfgrass, like any crop, has its ideal soil conditions. The closer you can get to the ideal, the healthier the grass. How would you know if you need lime? Let's say you need lime, which one would you use? What about a phosphorus deficiency. Most fertilizers have little P, so are you supposed to guess if you have deficiencies? Andy's plan is the right way to do it. Sure you can do a renovation by omitting steps, but if you want the best results you will do it the right way. Rushing it will usually result in doing it again next fall.

I start mine in November indoors, plant out on 3/1. And the 2nd season started a couple weeks ago, and I started mine outside so I dont have to go through hardening off the plant. I think you'd be fine to start some now, you might not harvest any before winter, but your plant will have a good size and be ready for spring. Its easy to over-winter the plant in our climate, just bring the plant inside on nights that we have a frost warning. Although that would be difficult with a 30 gallon container. For the peppers that I leave in the ground over-winter, I just cover them with hay at night.

Thanks pk, I got from landzdown a path from Corrine when I restored. It is different and it works too -If you call losing all data files working. The ports and menus are good. I have used Outlook for years and it is not easy to set up and keep. The new one might be better -easier. It is wonderfully powerful until a virus hits. It gives up data easily. Too many techs have played with my libraries and I have accepted today I will have to rebuild.. The empty libraries of work and life. My Pictures is under My documents. Yep. They are scattered but they are empty folders. Thanks for the wizard hint. Maybe someone will have an idea how to set it up libraries again. I never liked them-didn't need them. Thanks again... not too many users on here who use Outlook. Comcast doesn't like it and the port numbers change w/o notice as you may have experienced. Ellie

I've been following your threads and I feel for you. The whole renovation process can get overwhelming at times. I like your original design a lot - it has many beautiful features. I agree with what nancyjwb said about its functionality being not terrible, but not ideal. You could just move the sink off center and go with it if that's what you want to do (and you'd have a gorgeous kitchen.) But, if you want to make it function significantly better, I think you could make a few relatively minor changes. It would not require that you scrap the current design and start over. Here are 3 things you might think about tweaking, in order of importance (the last one being mostly aesthetic.) (Also, I think the recommendations you got in the other thread about the stacked cab heights and lining up doors were great - I'm assuming you're going ahead with those.) 1. Make sure all your aisles are wide enough. This probably means at least 48" on the two working sides of the island. It may mean you need to shrink the length of your island to about 9'. If your island is 9'x5', to get your 5 seats, it looks like you can put 3 facing the back wall and 2 facing the dining room. Check the distance to the angled window wall to make sure you have enough clearance there, though. 2. Move your cleanup sink to the pass-thru counter and put a prep sink in the island (to one side, probably toward the back window wall.) I think raising the back half of the pass thru to block the sink from the dining room is a good idea. If you are worried about only having 15" of space on each side of the sink with the current pass-thru design, I think you have 2 options: (a) move the sink off center to one side or the other so you have more continuous space on one end for putting dishes during cleanup (b) make the pass thru wider by turning the tall cabs on either side of the opening into glass cabs. These would be the ones in red, below:You would still have the tall cabinet at the left end of the pass-thru. In a big kitchen like yours, this would be a huge improvement in function and let multiple people work in the kitchen at the same time. (I am actually thinking of a similar design with the sink on a pass thru wall for my kitchen. More than anything else in my redesign, I want to be able to separate the cleanup zone from the prep/cooking zones.) With those 2 changes, I think your kitchen would function really well. 3. Like I said before, this one is more aesthetic than functional. There were a lot of comments in both threads about the weight of cabinetry on the back wall. I know you don't like the view out that side of the house and don't like the position of the current window, but you might want to think about putting in a pair of narrower windows on either side of the range like this: As others have suggested, you could use leaded or reeded glass to obscure the view while letting in light. You probably don't really need the storage of those uppers. This would address the 'heaviness' issue and brighten up your kitchen (see pic below.) But if you don't want to do it, then don't. Ultimately, it's your kitchen, and you should do what you want to. Based on the drawings, it is going to be beautiful!