I love side porches! In many of the older neighborhoods with beautiful traditional homes in our area, a side porch must have been a requirement. It's unusual for them not to have one. The side porches are usually recessed a few feet from the front of the house and extend out for 15' or so. Originally the porches were screened to "catch the breeze." Now, with air conditioning, many of them are glassed in. Whether glassed or screened, the porches afford wonderful landscape views on three sides. We'll have a 10' wide screen porch on the side of our new home---just wide enough to accomodate the 5' porch swing my uncle made for me 25 years ago. If you have a screen porch, you must add a porch swing! lkplatow, I love your porch. It's a great size.

Well since I started this discussion, I thought I'd report back to let everyone know we went with the finer 20/20 mesh. On the first day of construction, the builder brought two pieces out so we could compare the 18/14 with the 20/20. Turns out the view was not that different, when looking through the two, so we went with the finer mesh. I'm sure the 18/14 would have been fine, but since the builder was offer the 20/20 at no extra cost, we figured we should take advantage. Also, we've been able to feel plenty of breeze..., so we are happy with our choice. Thanks everyone for your feedback.

Well, a few things have changed since (1) I did some local browsing in stores yesterday and (2) my rug also arrived yesterday. I did not find a single thing that I really liked during my shopping trip. Also, I found the same fun wood/metal stools from World Market that I thought I'd love, but I realized they're really too small to be practical for use as a "table." I'm realizing that with just one end table in the corner between the two loveseats, I really need a coffee table setup that's going to work for, say, placing a bowl of chips (um, I mean fruit) as well as possibly putting up our feet. Also, while I do like the rug, the colors aren't exactly what I thought they'd be -- more muted, and what I thought might have been a gray color is really brown. Actually, it has a lot more brown than I expected -- even the border is brown, whereas in the picture on the HD web site, it's blue. Anyway, most of the brightly colored table options really won't work with the rug. Now I am looking at these LL Bean tables... I'd get two of them so they can be moved around as needed (more flexible than the coffee table) and I'd get them in the Sand color, I think, because that color seems to work with the "sand" color in the rug as well as the actual color of the porch -- it will all be painted the same as the trim color of my house, which is Linen White. They are pricier than some, but they seem built to last. And the "Mission" style reflects back to some of the furniture inside my house...and works well with the style of the loveseats too, I think. Here is a link that might be useful: LL bean tables

I am trying to find a good solution for my patio. The entire home has casement windows except the foyer which has 2 side by side 4' fixed over awning windows. Current Casement window doesn't open completely due to the cover over the new patio addition. Would love to have a pass through from the dining area to the patio cooking area, but not sure how to solve for the window. Will a double hung look odd on an MCM home? Will it look odd if only the 2 dining room windows are double hung? Could I do a fixed transom window over a casement window?