Sandra, we are thinking of using schoolhouse pendants and also have an open floor plan. If you feel like sharing I would love to see a photo of your kitchen/dining room with the lights you decided to use.

Depends on the room the chandy is in. In a more contemporary home, I'd probably use the white sleeves. Nothing to really keep clean. Dust the chandy once in a while. If you want to actually wash the sleeves, you just remove the bulb and slip the sleeve off and wash them. I have a small chandy like that in my kitchen, which was there when I bought the house. It has the white sleeves. I should change them to the honey, not that I think about it! The dining room chandy I have from Ace Iron doesn't have any sleeves (it's a ring-style chandy, so no pillars/sleeves for the bulbs). OP's house is a 1900s farmhouse, so I'd def. go with the honey or antique if that were my house.

Move the light fixture now while you are remodeling...doing a half job is never cost effective. There are literally thousands of ceiling fixtures on line....put in the time and look them over You are bound to find what you like at a price you can afford.

I understand you want to coordinate with your wall mounted sconces and if you have an 8 ft ceiling, you don't want the fixture to hang too low, thus the 18" height limit, correct? I really like them all, but probably would select the one with the single shade. It looks like it would work very nicely in a bedroom and with your bed. eta: you might be able to find a chandelier that meets your height requirement. These are all from the Bellacor site where you can filter by height and finish: this says it's bronze, but they pictured a silver finish: