Every region has its own unique building and budget experiences. It's hard to believe that all of the builders told you that a 2-story is more expensive to build than a 1-story, but, for them, I'm sure it must be true (and they would most certainly price it that way)! Everyone is different, so "farmhouse" means a lot of things to a lot of people. Classic and traditional farmhouses in the 20th century tend to be 2-stories. But as the photos above illustrate, there are a great many "vernacular" approaches for 1-story houses which are very appealing. The one thing I'd suggest as a high priority is that the rear of your property be south facing so that the main living areas can look out to the south and have a large amount of natural light and passive energy conservation potential. No other orientation has this potential, unless your property is in the southern hemisphere, in which case you will want the major living areas north facing! Good luck!

Cute stove! Since it doesn't get hot on the sides, you can probably move the fridge closer than you have been showing in your drawings. Of course, you will want to look at the booklet that comes with the stove or contact the manufacturer to be sure you stay in compliance. I'm so glad you're doing mock-ups. I think that's the best way to really be sure. And your temporary peninsula sounds great! I'm sorry I don't have anything specific to add other than to say, if I haven't yet, that I much prefer the range not in the corner. If you have a small work table in the kitchen, you can use that to set things right out of the fridge. You don't need a lot of counter between fridge and range. You do want as much work counter as possible between sink and range. That's your prime prep area. So the range in the corner takes away some of your prep space. Also, think about people standing and the space they take up. If the range is in the corner and someone is prepping while someone else is working at the range, they will be quite tight together, without good clearance between each other for standing, moving arms, etc. All in all, I think you're on the right track. If you haven't done so yet, please find the post titled "New to Kitchens - Read Me First". It's usually on one of the first pages of this forum. It has a lot of links in it to good stuff that might be helpful. Also, google "Starcraft's 31 Illustrated Rules of Kitchen Design". This is another excellent resource. Basically, it gives you the NKBA's recommended guidelines for clearances for safety and workflow in illustrations to make it easy to understand and ensure you follow. For example, I never remember exactly what the recommended minimum counter is on each side of the range. I think it's something like 15-18". But you will want to look that up so that you have sufficient space between range and fridge. You don't need more than the minimum in that spot as you won't really be using that for a work counter but you don't want any less than recommended either. Last point. The best storage is use-in-place storage. People who have taken the time to figure out just what they want to do in which place in the kitchen, and then measure their items to get proper drawer sizes to store those items where they need it, typically are the most happy with their kitchens. Oh, another last point. Drawers. All your lowers should be drawers. So much more accessible and they can actually store more than lower cabinets, even those with roll-out shelves. See how moving the range down gives you a much nicer prep area! And the table gives you a decent secondary prep area. With your baking center, you're in good shape.

One thing that bothers me is the kids have windows on only one wall. That means not a lot of light during the day and not a lot of cross ventilation for those days and nights that heating/cooling are not needed. I would love to figure out a way to get the bathroom off the corner of the girls room so she could take advantage of being on the corner and the same with boy's room 2 with maybe moving the outdoor bath somewhere else. I do agree with you that you should have a place to rinse off, etc. I did make two changes on your master side of the house. Basically just moving the closet doors around. Especially instead of from your closet to your utility room, changing it from your closet to your hallway right near the door to the utility room. It's still close enough to carry your laundry there, but the advantage now is if you need to run to your closet to get something you forgot, it's an easier in and out than running an obstacle course through your utility closet. Additionally I changed the door from your bathroom into the closet to put the door towards the end of the closet. I did this because corners in closets are wasted space so put the doors there instead. The only reason I didn't do it to the main hallway from your closet is you have to balance the corner closet space with the idea of looking down your long hallway and seeing a doorway instead of a nice vignette. And it's the corner issue why I moved the door into the pantry too.

Hi there! Thanks for the comments. The funding for the project is all coming from my family's end and it will be my house on my land. We have a cohabitation agreement and have been living together for a while now. Thanks for the advice, but I'm not worried about that. Thanks for the advice regarding the size of the roof, windows, and topography. The land is flat - it's been used for crops for the past 10 years. It has excellent drainage as well. It's located in Eastern Ontario, CA Mrspete: that's exactly the exterior look I was hoping for. I don't like the exterior of the plan I had initially picked at all. I'm definitely not too attached to that plan, and will follow your advice to seek out an architect. I thought searching for a plan might help give me a better guide to show an architect a general placement of rooms. Looks like this plan is a total bust! No problem. I only started searching for plans because I prefer to go into meetings with professionals feeling as prepared as possible. I'm just hoping for as much info as possible in order to get my money's worth and make good choices! cpartist: thanks so much for the advice re: the roof size - that's something I had not thought of. I didn't think about cross-breeze either. Our apartment in the city is in a stacked-townhouse and really doesn't get much airflow. We're total newbies on what we could expect or even hope for Great point about the windows, everyone! I'm interested in having a basement, and that's the most popular option in the area. Ok, back to the drawing board! Thanks for sharing your advice.