Personally, I would skip the bar seating and only do table/chairs in breakfast room. If don't need the formal DR, I would take out that wall and open it all up for my family of 8. You can then do an island that people can walk around, and not cause a traffic jam that will happen with the current layout.

I am considering the same thing so funny you are posting this now! I'll be interested to hear opinions. Although we would replace the sliding door (which goes to a 3 season room) with a smaller exterior french door that opens out and both sides of the door open (hard to find this type of door but we found one company that makes them).

If we do this layout we are planning on closing the wall from the counter down so the peninsula doesn't go in front of the door - but we'd put a sidelight type window above the counter so we don't lose light or views... here is a (very) rough rendering to see what I mean.

kim k, would you mind sharing info or a link on the company that makes the smaller exterior french door you mention in your post? Thanks!

I've seen the setup Mamagoose suggested in homes in my area and it seems to work out fine. However, if you're taking down the wall between the breakfast nook and dining room anyway, I think it makes more sense to have an island (no peninsula) and a large enough table to seat your entire family of 8.

I see no issue with the seating in front of the stationary side of the sliding door.

Allison, yes, we are definitely taking down that wall to the dining room so we can fit a table for eight. I also got a suggestion for an island on my main thread - so we now have two votes for that. It's funny, because at first I wanted and island and then after reading so many posts here of people wanting islands and being told they don't have the aisle clearance for it, I thought I'd have to do a peninsula. Cpartist showed on my main thread that it is indeed possible.

Of course! https://www.milgard.com/doors/style/out-swing-french-doors

Wow! Three votes now for an island plan over this one. Doing an island would mean the sink would be on the island and would be visible as soon as you walk in the front door. (The person at the sink would have their back to the front door.) I thought that was unorthodox, too, but I am willing to be convinced otherwise.

We are also combining our dining room and kitchen for our family of 6. The wall we are taking down is our stove wall (roughly where the fridge is in the rendering I posted) so everything needs to be moved around... right now we are thinking it through but going to get an independent designer involved soon. Our quotes so far have been almost triple your budget :/ it does include plumbing changes for the two sinks though which I know is adding a lot, a good deal of electric work and I think I have more cabinets... I really hope you can figure this out and get everything you want in your budget though!

Mama goose is great with floor plans and I am not trying to second guess her, but it looks like you only have about 6’ or so in the U of the kitchen. I will say we have about 5’ in the U of our kitchen and it is incredibly cramped for my family of 4. Our old kitchen had a 6’ U and it was better, but still cramped, and that is for 4 people. We are redoing our kitchen specifically to get rid of the tight U and open it up. We are taking down the walls between the kitchen, dining room and living room and eliminating our peninsula, taking the kitchen into the eat in area and adding an island. We will end up with a large kitchen with island and 1 eating area (dining room), instead of 2 (island will have seating too though). That may not work for you in your space and budget (we are actually having to move our slider to the dining room area), but it is something to think about if you don’t need both the dining room and eat in area. Your kitchen as drawn by mamagoose would be better than ours because we have a door beside the range, where you have prep space, so all our work space is actually in the U, but I think it may work better for your larger family if it were more open than a U.

we have that and no one sits there. Make an L on two kitchen walls and an island if you want seating to be used. Or make the breakfast nook more a destination with larger table or banquette and at the same time tightening up the G shape kitchen. A tiny breakfast nook with stools on peninsula adjacent is redundant and neither has the presence you want in the end.

Here is a link to Katie's other thread

I see no issue with the seating in front of the glass slider, but I agree with the others that the U is way too small for a multi-cook household. However, if you can consider moving the slider along with removing the wall between dining and breakfast nook, that would open up a lot of other possibilities. If not, I think an island plan is the way to go.

Katie - why would you have to move the sink to the island if you remove the peninsula and put an island in? I would leave the sink right where it is, in front of the window. This is the exact setup I have. The kitchen is U shaped with a small island (I think it's 48 inches long). If one of my kids wants to help me cook, I have him/her stand on the side of the island by the refrigerator and I stand on the side by the sink as there's not enough room for 2 butts in the same lane. (Well, there technically is, but I like my space when I cook)

I also didn’t put my sink on my island for precisely the reason you mention, I didn’t want it visible from the front door. My sink is actually a little further down the wall, so not directly behind the island and not visible from the door. Our island will be used for seating, baking and prep. I didn’t want the expense of adding a prep sink when I have a large counter between the sink and stove that can be used for “messy” prep, but I figure there are a lot of things that can be done on the island without a sink and the sink is only a few steps away if needed. Who knows I may end up regretting it but only time will tell. With any remodel there are compromises, that was one I was willing to make. That said, I am definitely not a layout guru, I am just letting you know my thought process when I went through this.

If one of my kids wants to help me cook, I have him/her stand on the side of the island by the refrigerator and I stand on the side by the sink as there's not enough room for 2 butts in the same lane. (Well, there technically is, but I like my space when I cook)

Because her kitchen is not wide enough for an island with the sink where it was shown in Mama's plan.

Her space is 138" wide.

The perimeter takes up 25.5" of space which leaves 112.5". For the number of cooks in her family she ideally needs 48" of space for cooking which leaves 64.5". Or if she goes with a narrower aisle, she'd have 70.5". Put a 36" wide island in and that leaves only 28.5" of walking space on the opposite side. With a 42" aisle on the working side, that only leaves 34.5" of space which is still too narrow.

why would you have to move the sink to the island if you remove the peninsula and put an island in? I would leave the sink right where it is, in front of the window.

I'd love to leave the window there, but cpartist is quite right about the numbers and fitting in an island (I've crunched those numbers many, many times!). And cpartist is again right about an island being the best for the number in my household. The main reason I am hesitant to lose the peninsula and move the sink isn't actually seeing the sink from the foyer, it's moving it on the other side of an aisle from the range. Am I silly to dread lugging a big, heavy pot of water from the sink to the range, and - my greatest fear - carrying a big, heavy pot of boiling water across an aisle with children around?

Am I silly to dread lugging a big, heavy pot of water from the sink to the range, and - my greatest fear - carrying a big, heavy pot of boiling water across an aisle with children around?

While I wouldn't recommend it for you, the other solution would be to put a small prep sink between the fridge and cooktop. While that would solve your fear of lugging boiling water, and create an additional prep zone, it would also mean less storage and of course be more $$$.

I'm assuming with all those kids, you're quite capable of lugging a large pot of water that short a distance. And do what I used to do since my cooktop used to be opposite my water source.

Move over kids!!! LOL.

I'm reviving this old thread because the cost of doing other plans have now made it more attractive than ever to do the plan of having the overhang seating go past the sliding glass door, which we discussed here.

kim k, I'd love to hear/see how things are with your plans, which were similar to mine.

chocolatebunny123, you said you've seen this in homes and it seems to work out fine. Do you happen to have pictures that would help me envision this set up?

Hi Katie, Did you end up doing this? I am interested in doing a similar peninsula ides in front of part of sliding glass door and googled about it to see if it is feasible. Thank you! Jodi

We completed our renovation. We did a peninsula with the main clean up sink by the door however no seating on that side. Good luck!

kim k - did you end up doing a window over the peninsula? thanks!