Why aren't the lights dimmable? If they are incandescent they should be able to be dimmed. If they are fluorescent, they make dimmable fluorescent ballasts and dimmers -- but it is costly. Can you post a site of what you are looking for. We might be able to be of better assistance.

So sorry Raehelen!!!! It looks like it's not such a great week after all....for both of us. Today, the change order was brought to me to sign and guess what...they want me to pay an additional $371 for the 6" pullouts w/filler overlay (the cost over the 9" cabinets). I refused to sign it and called my KD. Her stance is that I'm getting more functional cabinets so I should be willing to pay the difference and that my only other alternative is non-functional fillers. Needless to say, we are steaming! I reminded her of our conversation last week when she stated that she would talk to her management about "marking down" the pullouts w/the overlay so they would be the same as the cabinets, but she seems pretty insistent that the best I will be able to do is MAYBE split the difference. None of these alternatives are acceptable at this point. She insisted that I have to sign the change order before she can order the products and that we can't get moving until that is done. She said we could work it out later at the end of the project. HOWEVER, the change order specifically says that we agree to pay the difference so I refuse to sign it b/c I know it will come back to haunt us in the end! Next, she tells me that the contractor thinks the Message Center niche in the pantry wall won't work b/c there won't be anything to attach the inside pantry shelves to. First of all, they aren't putting in the shelves, we are...so that's not their problem. Secondly, I explained to her that we already know how we're going to handle the shelves and they will be more than strong enough. So now she says she has to talk to the contractor again. So, with all this happening today, I got on the phone to call the Customer Rep who was supposed to be at our meeting last week but was too ill to attend. It turns out our KD told her that we had agreed to pay the difference...I told her that was definitely NOT the case and that we had said we did not want to pay another cent for our cabinets. I also explained that we have now lost 21" in base cabinetry plus our Message Center, and that b/c our pantry is now smaller in the one direction that we now have a smaller FR doorway than was planned or wanted. I pretty much unloaded all the problems we had. She now wants to talk to our KD and KD's manager and plans to come out Friday AM w/the contractor to see what's up. She told me she thought we only had two minor measuring problems. BTW...it turns out the Customer Rep is actually the Zone Manager. I'm hoping that my refusal to sign the c/o will give me some leverage since it appears it is holding up the project. They REALLY want to get moving. I have had it now...and I am now on the warpath (so to speak)...no more "Mr. Nice Guy" (my DH's words!)

Thanks Bill! You are a life saver! My "weekend" is over now, but I'll tackle it again next weekend, and I can stew over the color that whole time :) Fern- thank you! The tiles are a natural tumbled stone called "seagrass" and I got them from Arizona Tile, but I have seen very similar things elsewhere. (Arizona had by far the best price, and really good customer service.) There is a fair amount of variation in color and in the amount of shell/fossil bits in each one, but I wanted that variety. The glass accents are Sonoma Tiles "tantrum" in Tiki green and Tazo green. As far as the pattern goes, it really is random. If you have something printed out, it is prolly the little layout that Holligator made just to encourage me to "go random". I never had something printed of my own. I really did just lay them out on my dining room floor till it "looked right" and I did have to go back and mess with it a lot. First I did the field tile, then I went back and replaced 2x2's with glass tiles where I thought they'd look best and be well visible. (They are too expensive to get stuck behind the coffee maker!!!) The hardest part was trying to decide how much of each tile size to buy. If you are planning something really similar, I'd be happy to look up those details, since I ended up with very little waste, but enough tile to practice with first.

Thanks everyone. The blue, I guess, is ok for now. It just doesn't really sit well with me but I suppose it's better than hot pink or something like that. :) As for the toaster, I measured our cabs and it won't fit in any of them b/c there's a middle divider. :/ The toaster is approx 15x15x15. So for now, I'm going to put it in the corner in the dining area, where the door meets the back wall. I just found this side table with a marble top at the Salvation Army that I might use. There's also quite a few kitchen carts at places like Ikea but I'm leaning towards the side table. The more permanent plan is to buy one of those 24" fridges (kitchen forum currently has a thread on small apps--and now I want to trade all my big size apps for smaller ones!). Anyway, there's one that is rather short (~55 in) and that will give me ample room on top of the fridge to put some kind of open shelving and then use something like a rev-a-shelf thing to slide the toaster forward when I need to use it and then just push it back to place when i'm not using it. That might even give me enough room on the side of the fridge to put in some kind of storage area.