I have a very similar house except mine is flipped. When I enter my house from the front the living area is to the right and the bedrooms to the left. We do not have the slider in the dining room which I would have preferred, and instead have a regular door in the back left corner of the kitchen. I took down all the walls and have been really happy with my decision. Our layout is a bit different then yours though, it seems as though our dining room is where your kitchen is and vice versa. Kitchen as viewed from dining room. The stove is located where your fridge is. View from living room. To the right is a sort of island. We took our walls halfway down and put cabinets only on the kitchen side to save money. Eventually we are thinking of putting some type of stone to cover drywall. Apologies for the poor quality cell phone images. It's the only ones I had in my photobucket account and I think the first two are from the day we got the granite installed. For you I would start with working on a "L" shaped layout on the fridge wall and sink wall. I like the idea of the peninsula except for the fact that you have the sliding glass door and the stools could possible block the entrance a little, depending on which way the door slides open. If you wanted to do an island, in one of the kitchen displays at ikea they had a very similar layout to mine except the island was rounded instead of an "L" I think that would work well for you. I hope this helps a little bit. Hopefully one of the layout gurus will have some better ideas. I found this site a bit too late to have them work on mine.

We wouldn't say there is a disadvantage, but if enclosed to be 4 season then it's really not so much a porch, but an additional interior space. You'll miss out on the feeling of being outdoors during the other seasons.....

Re-post from Lighting Forum seeking more help THANKS!!! We are building a new home and are having trouble with selecting a chandelier for the dining room as you enter the home. Pendent lighting suggestion would also be helpful. The floor plan is an open concept making the kitchen, family room and four season porch visible as you enter the dining room. The dining room is approximately W=15’ x L=17’; all ceiling heights are 9'. Our thoughts are having a chandelier that does not block the view into the rest of the living areas. This is a photo of our neighbors same style home. The builder provides picture frame wainscoting in the dining room and family room with the wall color being BM Barron Plain Gray. The kitchen cabinets are ivory white with a gray subway tile backsplash with Arabesque tile behind the range. We will be using European Alleanza Vagil quartz on the island and countertops. We are not sure what style of chandelier the area calls for. The dining room table, chairs and hutch are dark cherry. The table is 32” wide and opens to 108” when it is open with the three 12” leafs. The majority of the time it will be 84”. We like the farmhouse look but don’t know if the home style is suited for the farmhouse style lighting. Also you do not like the circular wagon wheel look. We do not like contemporary or ornate; we are more casual. Thanks

I bought the Capitol Pendant from CB2 for my dining room and added two recessed lights to go along with it but I think it may be too modern for your space. After I had already made my lighting decisions, I saw this one at a West Elm store that I looked striking in real life and I was tempted to use this instead but my lights were already in.