Hi Lady_West, I frequent other forums normally, but I noticed your post when signing onto gardenweb today. I wanted to tell you that I love your bungalow and, fwiw, add some suggestions/thoughts on choosing dining tables and chairs :-) Of the choices, I like the table in #4 best. It looks like Tell City furniture to me. My Mom has Tell City in a little different style and she always says the wood is called "hard rock" maple. It has mellowed to rich brown tones and I guess it just looks like home to me :-) Also, about the table in choice #4, the long sides look like they are drop leaf. The bench could go along the side with 2 chairs on the other side and one at each end. That is probably the length it will be, I doubt it has leafs. You will want to measure your dining space to be confident of the max size of extended table that will fit in your dining room. Consider getting around with the chairs in place as well as if there is room for a hutch buffet, if that is included. With a "real" wood dining table, the top is not Formica and will stain and ring (over time) from drink glasses and spills that are not immediately wiped up. Heated dishes can mar the finish as well. That is why most ladies of the "dining room" era would have used table pads under the table cloth, to protect the table surface. For daily use, a Formica top table, while not as pretty, is more scratch resistant, durable and practical for young active families. When viewing the chairs in person, test them for joint strength. Put one hand on the back and the other on the seat, using downward pressure wiggle the chair. You can tell very quickly if they are sturdy or worn out. Also, sit in them and if the back "gives" or makes a pop or crack noise, beware. Long tables, like the one in choice #5, tend to sag in the middle without support. Vintage 5 leg kitchen tables had the support for extra length. A 5 leg kitchen table is another style you might consider in your new home. Also, if the leaves of the table are stored in a closet or under a bed, they can become a different color hue from the unprotected everyday used table. Be sure to examine it all together in daylight, so you can see more clearly what you are getting. You might consider waiting to buy wood dining furniture set until you uncover and refinish your wood floors. If the wood furniture matches the floor too closely, they blend in and their beauty is lost. Congrats on beginning a new chapter in your life. Take your time, purchase what you love and it will feel comfortable and look like your home. Have fun, Deb

Funkycamper as absolutely right. Recreating a period kitchen is not just a matter of slavishly copying the materials and features of the era you are looking to reproduce, but a process of keeping the feel of the period while incorporating modern conveniences. Stainless steel was rare in the 1920s, but available. In fact, it was used on the top of the Chrysler Building in NYC in the 1930s. So use it. Just don't go overboard with it. Take a look at thebathroom we installed in a 1928 Craftsman house. It has wholly modern faucets, vessel sinks, Asian-inspired vanity lamps, and stainless, very modern, bar pulls. But it "feels" like a craftsman bath with its rift oak cabinets and funky period tile. Anyone can copy a period kitchen. The art lies in recreating the ambiance of the period while designing a functional, modern kitchen. Lots of people here can, and have done it. So can you. It's not easy, but if it was easy, it would not be any fun.

Your house is beautiful. I just painted my new craftsman in SW FL with Sherwin Williams 7726 Lemon Verbena for the hardie siding on top, SW 7733 Bamboo Shoot for the stucco on the first floor and SW 7730 Forestwood for the trim. I just personally love greens for a craftsman house but felt that with the light in FL, the greens had to be a bit cleaner and brighter than what is normally chosen for the rest of the country. (The trim isn't finished being painted.)

We have a four-square house built in 1920 and have been researching how to improve curb appeal also! Glad I found this thread. My thoughts regarding the house you're considering would be to extend the roof of the front right sunroom to a full front porch. That would present a symmetrical appearance on the street side. We actually have a defined side entrance and a front porch with the main entrance, but the driveway goes to the side door. The builder of the home was a doctor, and he used the side entrance for patients. There was also a back door to the house, and an exterior door to the kitchen (the kitchen was built as a separate building that abuts the back of the house).