If you are set on this design, I would move the laundry door to the kitchen so that wall does not get chopped up looking from the kitchen. You also want to push out the door to be flush with the frig and oven. This will make the inside of the laundry room a bit odd but you want the esthetics from the kitchen not from the laundry room. I would play with the placement of the door into the laundry room. Bottom left of the kitchen may work where there is already an odd jog in the laundry room. You will lose straight shot out to the back door from the kitchen, however. I would consider island seating such that you are facing out the window while eating if you have east facing window/sliding glass door. I think you have enough room. It is wonderful to eat breakfast while looking out to the morning light! I would rid of some of the uppers and lighten the space a little. The cabinet design is too filled in and heavy, IMHO. In your pictures, there does not seem to be a good way to get from the upper deck to the lower pool. Is that a possibility? You really want to be able to acess the pool and your wonderful backyard from your kitchen. Otherwise, you have to maintain two kitchens in the summer. (been there and done that, and it is a PITA!) I have a house where our upper deck does not connect to the lower level. This is the WORST design about our house! I speak from experience... We don't have enough lot to make it happen being in the city. There are always limitations to the houses we live in.

suedonim75- when we have company over, everyone either goes to the living room or the family room. The kitchen currently feels closed off from both. I don't want to knock down the two walls (one adjoining the dining room, and the other into the living room) because I would lose all my cabinet space. Was wondering if there was a way of solving this by knocking down wall into FR instead. (may not be possible, but wanted to see if anyone has tried it)

Thank you for your comments!. Right now the island is about 3'x5' with 36 inches all the way around it. I know this is smaller than most would desire - but it hasn't been a problem for us. I would certainly consider a range vice a wall oven. The issue i have with it being on the wall where the oven is now is that my cook/prep area would be mostly behind me, and even then - its the narrow side of the island. It might work - i'm just not 100% sold on that yet. I thought about the fridge next to the pantry - but the biggest issue there is that i only have 24 inches of depth - and thus the fridge will stick out into the walkway. I thought about a counter depth fridge, but i only have 36 inches to work with there - and the reduction in fridge space would be a non-starter (its always PACKED!) Removing the wall oven is certainly something we're looking at to maximize counter space. One thought i got from your comment is maybe splitting up the cooktop on the exterior wall and then putting the oven under counter next to the pantry. Something like this is an option i was considering.

The notion of private spaces entering directly onto public spaces never even crossed my mind to be honest, but seeing it in that context it makes sense. The privacy need hasn't been very apparent given that we have two kids under 5 and rarely have guests that stay overnight. The den area currently doesn't get much of any natural light as is right now with only the small kitchen window and window in the dining area. Figured by adding the 3 windows in the kitchen we'd get much more light there than we do currently. We're on a slab foundation and would like to avoid moving the front door if we can as there is a covered porch out front which ties into our roof. The short kitchen wall has the gas supply for the stove so if that could stay put it would help budget on a larger project. I'd need to see if I can make a bedroom door work with those constraints. First pass looks pretty clunky... when trying to move the fewest number of walls.