Also PPS7 - We thought for a long time about powder room placement when it came to the house plans.. We saw many ideas on where people put them but for the most part the options we were seeing was to either A) put it in the foyer area of the home, B) put it off the kitchen, or C) put it off the dining room.. After giving it some thought we really didnt like the idea of putting the powder room off of any of the eating areas.. We also didnt like the idea of putting it in the foyer.. The idea of walking into a home and bam there is the bathroom.. Again its personal preference but we just like the idea of having it more tucked away.. We were actually goign to not even have a mudroom but personally I hated the idea of walking directly into a main room of the home, whether it be the foyer, living room, kitchen, etc.. I like the separate entrance.. And honeslty the most I see being stored in that room is coats and shoes.. However we were thinking of reworking this area as we would like a side entrance into the home.. We were thinking of moving the mudroom to where the powder room is and then putting the powder room where the entry door from the garage is located and doing a powder room that is narrower so that when you open the door you have toilet on left and sink on right.. But again we do like the current setup.. Here is what it would look like:

i have a runner in my second floor hall... the front stairs has the runner continue down, the back stairs is just 150 year old bare pine. its very disconcerting stepping from carpet directly down to bare step, to the extent that my husband wont ever go down the back stairs. are you going to do a runner on your stairs? it makes it a bit easier to tie into the top. otherwise, remove the carpet back to some hardwood at the top. you need to expose around the railing too, for a nice wooden shoe that matches the rest of the stairs, otherwise you'll have to revisit wood stair work again. (fwiw, it hurts a lot less to fall on a runner than on a bare stairs. cracks fewer ribs, too.)

If you insist on the lighter flooring, then I would go with the slightly darker version (the one on the left in the last photo). Are you keeping the brick? If you are, the slightly darker wood floors are a better compliment than the super light wood. If you are removing the brick and rebuilding the stairs, then you will want to find out if either of the vinyl floors have stair treads and nosing available. People who have used vinyl that does NOT have treads/nosing found their BIGGEST headache comes from trying to find a solution to this problem. As for your darker wood floors, they look (just one photo with one chip out of the wood) like they could be ready for a sand/refinish. If they are, I HIGHLY recommend doing the hardwood FIRST...and then choosing the fake-wood look product for the den. You might find a good colour match can be had if your red oak hardwoods can be sanded and refinished as 'raw' = the colour of the planks you want to use. How old are your hardwood floors? If the finish is very close to 20 years old, they are ready for a full sand/refinish. It is always advisable to figure out the BIG ticket item before you try to figure out a small ticket item. And if you are refinishing the hardwood, why not add more of the same??

The stairs had to be designed with a finish material in mind, to keep them code compliant for riser and run. What material were they designed to use? If you dont know, that probably means carpet. Its the far better choice to muffle the thundering herd on the stairs to a media room.