Thanks Johnatemp! I am going to persuade DH to rearrange furniture in the next 2 weeks. We were considering it for xmas but we already had the tree up and it would have meant moving that and we ran out of steam. Hopefully I can work on him doing this and take some pics. One problem is the darn TV cable. To move the TV cable over there we ran it under the rug in front of the one opening. That will be a pain. One question/issue: I don;t think the sofa table I have will fit right behind the sofa. I think its tooo short to go behind the long sofa. Also then I wouldn;t have anything to put behind the other couch. I am wondering if we can "make" something that would be long enough to put behind the sofa. It won't really show I guess. When we had the TV on the Tall wall we only had a small TV stand - but we still found that TV needed to be closer to that one entrance in order for optimal viewing. I guess we could do one chair on that long side thats on the one side of the TV, What do you think?? I love the idea of the big ottoman. I was thinking leather but a plaid might work as well. The drapes on either side of the FP don;t go all the way down.. I know. We mounted the rod a little higher on those. I have baseboard heater beneath one and I was nervous about the curtains touching it. Any suggestions on drapes.. I can;t seem to find anything that I like. I saw renofans post on her "game room transformation" and I was thinking something like that. I have white plantation style blinds in the rest of the house. I wonder if I could get them to fit those 2 windows and then I would swag the panels to opposite sides.?? hmm.. might look into the cost of that. I love the idea of the white birch in a basket. We need to get a real log holder for the FP logs. We are using a make shift crappy basket now. Any other ideas??? Would you do an area rug? If so any suggestions. Nothing too girly or too too modern. Wow.. sorry didn't realize how long this was.. lol Ruth

Certainly no bash on my lovely friend LL, but this has been a source of contention between me and my mother. When we were planning the MIL quarters for her to be built on to my home, she had little scale pieces of her furniture that she insisted on laying out with each floor plan. None of this furniture is heirloom, or even old for that matter just what she currently had (5-10 years old). I kept trying to explain, as gently as possible, that there are MANY different dressers, beds, sofas, etc with different measurements and that we shouldn't build it to fit her current furniture, we should focus on a good layout. She basically ignored me because she has been obsessed with keeping things the same. This has resulted in a (very poor IMO) layout that I will eventually have to redo in the future. For now though, it wasn't worth the fight. IMHO, unless it is an heirloom/priceless piece, you should NOT design a room around it!

Recently, I had a custom-made entertainment center built in for my family room. I used the same cabinet maker who made the cabinets for my kitchen. I'm still researching seating options to replace my aging couches. My room is smaller than yours, 13' x 15'. As part of the remodel, I removed a wood-burning fp from a corner of the room. I had planned to replace it with a linear, direct-vent fp under the TV, but omitted the fp. Direct-vent needs no flue or chimney, but it does need to vent to the outside. Here are some inspiration photos with a linear fp. Layout below has 2 chairs on the window wall. TV, fp, and matching bookcases on long wall. 2 floating couches. I think the TV is too high, but there is storage space and seating is a comfortable viewing distance from the TV. Layout below has 2 chairs on the window wall, TV on the left, short wall, and 2 floating couches. But that would leave you with one long empty wall. Sectional with fireplace, TV, and one bookcase on long wall Below, the TV and fireplace are on the same wall, but separated. Not much storage in this one. I decided to go with a layout similar to the one below - without a fireplace under the TV. You may have enough room for something like this layout below. I' don't like seeing the back of a couch when I enter a room - but I think it looks OK if there's a sofa table behind the couch.

Benjesbride, what you say regarding dining/island makes sense, but unfortunately I have ~11'x16' space to fit in the kitchen. If I decide to rotate the kitchen the way you say it, then my kitchen island will be quite small. I too started out thinking of a longer island and thus came up with option 2, and am not able to find pictures to tell me if that would look ok or not. Secondly, currently the plan is that the Great Room will be mainly conversation area. TV will be in a separate room, so no need to consider TV-watchability. Mama Rachel, your idea of spice kitchen is great! That's the kitchen I started out "wanting". I had to abandon it halfway, however, because of space constraints. My whole house is ~2200 sqft, therefore allocating disproportionately large amount of space to the kitchen would have meant I gave up on some other priorities. Mama Rachel : regarding powder: we decided to ditch the powder because of the availability of full bath on that floor, which otherwise will be guest bath. We also wanted as much storage as possible, therefore decided on having a storage rather than powder. Anyway, here's the original plan. Note that we added ~5ft towards the courtyard and some square footage along top wall (which is facing backyard). I am working on sizing of the entry right now, because I think it's a bit too big for the house, but that space will NOT become available to the kitchen again due to the building rules.