It seems that Maine Cottage Furniture is no more - foreclosed on by their bank - all customers lost their deposits. I Love Honor's turquoise cabs too - I would paint the window trim between them the same to tie it all together, maybe paint that wall a nice faded sunny yellow. I LOVE color too and plan to add it in my kitchen as well. I have a red Chambers stove and I want ultra glossy aqua or pale blue upper cabinets. I plan on having a glossy red stand-alone tall dish cabinet as well. My colors are red (stove), Jadeite and pale blue and aqua. I think I'll go with the pale blue cabs and jadeite backsplash and use my aqua stuff as accessories. I do LOVE that picture of pale aqua cabinets in the sunny yellow room, though! Neutrals - the floor - this is one area I would not go crazy with - very expensive to change. Of course, if I lived in a Spanish Mission bungalow, that'd be a whole other story ;) We put in custom milled long-plank random width Sassassfras wood. Currently it is a pale yellow / light orangey brown, but it darkens with age. I'm ignoring it in the design of the kitchen (it goes directly into the family room). We did purchase two red folk art floor mats made of neoprene from Plow and Hearth - one in front of the patio door, the other either in front of the sink or stove. They go really well with my Swedish and Polish folk art (which I MIGHT display on a plate rail above the header). The walls are a medium-dark (I really expected it to appear darker) green-grey, but once the cabs and backsplash go in the paint will mostly be in the family room. The dining room on the other side of the kitchen will be a steely aqua to match the upholstery (a shimmery steely aqua with dark red flowers and gold stems). It is an impossible color to match in a paint (changes in the light / shadow). I might use Ralph Lauren's metallic paint. My other "neutral" in the kitchen is stainless steel - I plan one wall to be all stainless appliances with glossy pale blue uppers at the ceiling. The kitchen will be an "L" with an island. The base cabs on the other wall will be either stainless (expensive) or a dark matte charcoal. For the island, I'm not sure, maybe more glossy red or even stained wood. The raised bartop will be butcher block. The rest of the counters will probably be either soapstone or concrete.

We have moisture issues so couldn't do wood (plus, we live on a ranch and hubby works around heavy machinery ALOT...our floors take a real beating!)...so, we went with travertine in most of the downstairs (we put *super* cushy carpet in the side tv room). I LOVE MY TRAVERTINE! It never looks dirty. We laid it in a three size versailles pattern which gives an "old world" style feel to the house. It's indestructible and everything cleans up perfectly...even spilled paint. We carried the travertine up the stairs...only on the riser part of the stairs..used the ultra cushy carpet on the step part. Kitchen was done in a dark porcelain tile with texture...also love it..never looks dirty, isn't slippery, cleans up so easily! Yes, the floors are hard. I just wear good shoes/slippers and no worries.

Here is a pic of our desk in progress: The top cabs will have seeded glass and house my grandmother's wedding china and some other treasures. The center bottom (of the top cabs) will be for a tv, phone, and modem stuff (hopefully most wires, etc hidden behind the tv). The lower cabs are being replaced by counterheight cabs. That's what we had in the kitchen before, and liked it that way. It was the only thing our cabinet guy and I failed to communicate about -- he saw desk on the plans and ordered desk height. I assumed he'd notice that they were cab height when he measured the old kitchen. Anyway, he was very nice when I called and said I wasn't happy and is replacing them with the counter height at their expense. I'll keep large hostess stuff in those cabs, and desk stuff in the drawers. We're using the same countertop on the desk as everywhere else(Cambria Branbury). I will make a fabric covered corkboard for the backsplash. There will be plugmold under the upper cabs. We liked having the desk in the kitchen before, so it was not changed much for the new kitchen -- just the glass doors and tv shelf in the uppers. It was home headquarters, and the place we left messages for each other, my purse -- it did collect some clutter, but I cleared it away regularly. It also made a great beverage station when we had parties. HTH --Amy

I hardly had any wall space left but I managed to buy a 1946 calender and find a space big enough to hang it. It has notations on it about setting eggs; hen, goose and duck. I added the pepper plaster plaques because I found them locally in my price range. Not my first choice but shipping from eBay gets out of hand. After MUCH discussion I decided against any type of backsplash and left it painted white so I use "old" prints and things as my backsplash. Two of the framed pictures on the SW counter were found in my machine shed. One is dated 1933 and I presume the other is likely in that same time frame. The calendar on the NW counter is from a grocery store no longer operating in my home town. Everything is either framed or laminated on its way to a frame. I like to change things every so often so this works for me. I have lots of pictures I've aquired over time. I could change everything every week and be good to go for a year. height=200> height=200> height=200> The advice >height=400> didn't work for me.