at the start, i insisted that all openings be cased, for 2 reasons - it looks finished and because we have 4 kids. now that we are trying to shave some costs, i am having to reconsider a few things. i thought that since they are 6 feet wide that maybe the kids won't touch them. however, as i'm typing, i see my 10 year old practicing some football move in between a huge 10 foot cased opening in to our dining room. lol!! so i'll leave them cased. they'll get really dingy otherwise. i already scream "don't touch my walls, please" at least 3 times a day to my children or a neighbors child. i don't need to add "don't touch the openings!"

For some reason I'm not getting replies sent to my email. Lots of great responses! I'm definitely planing cased opening and not paneled jambs. When we get slab poured and everything marked out I will mock up the furniture placement to decide on the casing to the right. All permits are in so hopefully this will be in the next month. Nini, I think your living room might be one I was admiring while we were planning. ;-) everyone seems to be doing fireplaces on interior walls so I've been nervous since we moved ours to the exterior wall. Hope it looks half as nice as third!!

I think this may have been posted elsewhere before, but I have to go make dinner so no time to search. This is still the best article I've seen on explaining the virus and understanding why infections/death continue to occur. The Risks - Know Them - Avoid Them By Erin Bromage | May 6, 2020 (updated periodically) (Her credentials and intent of this post on COVID-19 are listed at: https://www.erinbromage.com/post/about-the-author-professor-erin-bromage) (excerpt) It seems many people are breathing some relief, and I’m not sure why. An epidemic curve has a relatively predictable upslope and once the peak is reached, the back slope can also be predicted. We have robust data from the outbreaks in China and Italy, that shows the backside of the mortality curve declines slowly, with deaths persisting for months. Assuming we have just crested in deaths at 70k, it is possible that we lose another 70,000 people over the next 6 weeks as we come off that peak. That's what's going to happen with a lockdown. As states reopen, and we give the virus more fuel, all bets are off. I understand the reasons for reopening the economy, but I've said before, if you don't solve the biology, the economy won't recover. https://www.erinbromage.com/post/the-risks-know-them-avoid-them?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20200511&instance_id=18384&nl=the-morning&regi_id=127388736&segment_id=27239&te=1&user_id=0ae9199a646961c015d2bd26f2abc5bf

Usually I'd suggest you leave the opening go all the way to the ceiling if only because it is usually much easier to add a short wall over a doorway overhead than it is practical to remove one. One thing to consider. Heat rises so any wall over a doorway will be more likely to hold some of that heat against the ceiling in the room where the heat originates and that can make one room feel colder than another even with the same heat/ac system and it is compounded if direct sunlight enters and heats one room and not the other. If either room has a ceiling fan, the existence of that short wall above the door can matter with regard to heat exchange as the fan pulls up and/or pushes down air..