Wow! Lots of questions! Haha! Let's see. We live in New Orleans and are a very casual, fun, energetic family. DH and I are in our mid 30's and have a 9 year old and a 6 year old. Both kids are active outside of school. TV is a big part of our lives because of sports, movies, kids, etc. But Mike's Den is where lots of the sports programming will take place. :) We are planning to offset the TV and put it to the side of the fireplace for two reasons....1) Now that the kitchen is further over, if someone is in there, it will be more centered to the room as a whole and 2) it can be a bit lower and more at eye-level if it's not above the fireplace. We can make the built-ins accommodate the TV at a level more comfortable for viewing. There will also be a playroom/media room upstairs for the kids. So the Living Room TV will be the group/family TV I suppose. We take turns cooking but both work. So we aren't gourmet cooks but we enjoy cooking meals. We enjoy conversations from the kitchen, thus wanting the open plan. I'd say that because of kids' evening activities, we probably cook 3-4 days a week maybe? Other nights we grill or get take out, pick something up or go out to eat on the way home. The porch. The house (again, in New Orleans...flooding) must be elevated a bit). This porch is elevated with the house. I know we will also have lower space for a table and chairs and the grill, that we haven't laid out yet. We actually did talk about widening the porch. How wide would you suggest? My dad suggested 1-3 feet wider. What do you think? The front door...you see the stairs to the right of the kitchen? And the open pass-through there under the stairs in the drawing? If you go through that pass through...actually straight from the back door, you'd pass the turned stairs above you and a guest room above, master below (in the drawing) and the front door is that way. It's a narrow, New Orleans lot...50x122, which has made things interesting to lay out! :) Thanks again guys! Your feedback is great! Oh, and again, the furniture placement and the kitchen appliances, etc. is just there in the drawings as a guide. It's not fixed or anything. It's just a visual thing for reference.

Ah. So then a large opening like Patrice mentioned above will likely be your best bet. You'll still get spill over sunlight, but there will be a bit of a wall between the two windows so you don't see the trim so much. [Traditional Dining Room[(https://www.houzz.com/photos/traditional-dining-room-ideas-phbr1-bp~t_722~s_2107) by Chicago Interior Designers & Decorators Michael Abrams Limited OR, you could find a cool hutch type piece to go between the two windows - maybe to hold your 'bar' or display serving pieces or something? One like this is low enough that it won't block the light from the white-trimmed window. [Traditional Kitchen[(https://www.houzz.com/photos/traditional-kitchen-ideas-phbr1-bp~t_709~s_2107) by Minneapolis Design-Build Firms TreHus Architects+Interior Designers+Builders

I am not a KD but I love the idea of benches that fold up and a table that can be used for entertaining.. Very interesting! I love the idea of having a space for your family to eat as one of your important parts. My only worry (and this is because my family is messy) that if something spills on the counter it is going to flow right on to the back of those cushions. Of course your family is not the messy bunch mine was. (kids off to college now) I like your kitchen plans and look forward to seeing all the clever solutions that the experts provide.

Here is a mockup of an idea for your dining room and living room flip. Obviously, the final placement of the various pieces would depend on their size and necessary clearances/aisles, but this is the basic idea. You only really have two walls where the TV could go, so there aren't a whole lot of options. The orientation I chose makes the wood-burning stove a focus point, which I think is nice. I added a large coffee table between couch and loveseat, assumed a flat screen TV on the wall and added a rectangle in the new dining area to indicate a piece of furniture that could be anything, really (china cabinet, sideboard, bookcase, etc.). As for the kitchen, I went back to the open plan for this drawing. As you can see, having the dining area in the new location makes the seating in the kitchen somewhat redundant, although with kids I'm sure it will be useful. However, I agree with 3littlelights and others that this "open" plan still has you facing away from the open space for most of your kitchen tasks and is therefore not really accomplishing what you want it to accomplish. The layout of the sink, stove and fridge is also extremely awkward. What are the exact measurements of the wall with the sink on it? I know you said the windows were 72x36, but how much wall space is there between them and how much wall at either end? If there is no way to put the fridge on the same wall as the sink, then perhaps something like the plan below would work. It doesn't disguise the posts in any way, but it does give you a vastly better workflow and lets you face the open room while you are working at the sink (you'd want to move the dishwasher to the other side of the sink so it wasn't directly across from the oven).