I know you will hate me for this, but please understand my view point. I am an old house LOVER! I also spent twenty years as a banker trying to talk people into understanding that their future home purchase had to be about love....and practicality. When you are in love with a house you think that the fact that it slapped around the last owners was likely because they were bad owners...they probably deserved it because they didn't do the maintenance you would do to keep it in check. You justify the little issues like the third eye as something minor instead of realizing that a third eye is not actually a normal thing and will require some seriously expensive custom lenses. You turn a wet basement into a couple puddles.... Ten years,..no lets make it five if you get the house....if you find that my pessimistic attitude was totally incorrect and your home turned out to be perfect beyond compare...please tell me I am wrong so I can learn a lesson. But if on the other hand my gazillion years of trying to make people understand that they should buy a home they love....but should equally involve their brains and heart in the equation turns out to make some sense in your potential chris brown like situation.....well be sure to share that valuable experience as well so that others can learn from you...and make light of your experience because "that will never happen to them". I tried to buy the egg and I farm as a young wife ohhhhh so many years ago thinking that a house with walls falling down and a tree growing in the living room just needed our tender and inexperienced care to bring it back.....the bank laughed...thank god!

It is interesting the different perspectives that we all have re: the feeling we wish to have for a room. Still since it is a master I wonder if what you are really missing is a sense of "warmth" to the room vs the natural light. The white in a north facing dark room would be pretty dismal and not feel warm at all. I think with proper lighting and color you can create the "mood" you want with any color that speaks to you. Every single person who sees my mstr bedroom asks how I came up with the color after saying they love it but are certain they would never choose it. DH was sure he wouldn't like it but loves it too. I agree that on the chip it is questionable but in the room it creates a beautiful tranquil feeling that is warm and light at the same time. It mixes beautifully with silver tones and that adds a lot more light to the room - silver plated drapery rods, white murano glass pendants with silver leafing beside the bed over simple mirrored night stands - all help create the mood. It is an east facing room with full sliding doors that are covered with heavy silk - also light reflecting - drapes to allow sleep past 5:30 in the summer months! Light is not really an issue but as someone above mentioned we are in the room mostly at night and I don't want to feel like I am in a dark cave reading in bed at night. Anyway, I would recommend looking through inspiration photos of room here and on HGTV - figure out which ones create the mood you want for your room - avoiding any that seem require full natural light - and incorporate the colors into your room. Think about everything in the room and how it contributes to the feeling - bedding can make a huge difference. So many of the new designs incorporate silks and other reflective materials that can add to the warmth and light in the room.

Gardenwebber, that is SUCH a good point about "entertaining in their rooms". Here's a thought about your floorplan: have the kids take the back two bedrooms. Move your son to the smaller bedroom, the girls in the room with the closet. Take that wall that you guys put up and turn it into the bunk beds in separate rooms. This will give you a lot more useable floor space. Swing your youngest daughter's bed against the far wall and you will maximize the floor space there. Your son can have the lower bunk bed in his own room next door. That leaves the bedroom directly across from yours as a playroom. That also makes your own bedroom further away from the kids beds. The bunk beds are just drywalled with the mattress only on them. We have always had a rule that our kids cannot have a computer, video games or tv in their bedroom until they are 18. I do not want that stuff cluttering my downstairs living room. An upstairs space for this is the best solution. We built our current home knowing that we were going to have teens in them someday and to give them space separate from ours. Think about this solution. My husband would be happy to talk you and your husband thru the details if it is something you would be interested in. P.S. my 17y.o.'s boyfriend is coming for christmas for 17 days and there is no way in hell that she will be "entertaining" him in her bedroom!!!!!!!!!!!! Sherry

homepro01, I don't understand your comment about duct work for AC. I have forced air heating. I replaced the furnace (which is in the attic), ducts, and registers this year. I don't know what other duct work would be required for adding AC. I was told I would need to add a line for the refrigerant. The problem is where to place the outside unit. I'm in a townhouse. On the ground floor, the unit would be too close to neighbor's house to meet code. Alternative is to put the unit on the 2nd floor deck (hire a crane to put it there). The unit would be just outside my bedroom - I don't know if the noise would bother me. I'll look at the cirrus hugger fan. I have a Minka pancake fan in the living room and I don't think it cools the air as much as the Minka Artemis.