This is our first remodel project and we've certainly learned some lessons. We interviewed 4 companies - 2 design build firms and 2 architects. DH's uncle is an architect in another state and he was our sounding board as we went through the process, and gave suggestions on floor plan. Ideally, we would've had him do our house, but we couldn't afford it. We liked one architect's design portfolio, but decided we didn't have the money to do what they could've designed to really take advantage of their creativity. One of the design build's firm work was more in line with what we knew we could pull off. The floor plan they came up with is a good use of our space. If we had unlimited money, we would've gone a different option. Be prepared to consider options. We were dead set against touching the 2 bedrooms as we needed the space to live in, but the weird walk-in closet in one bedroom was the perfect location for the master bathroom. There were 2 closets in this room and it was minor change - building a 5' wall to close it off from the bedroom and creating a doorway in the other wall for access to the master. This one change made the entire layout work. We did consider minor changes, but they didn't fix underlying problems with layout. That's why people are suggesting you consider relocating kitchen or opening up some walls. Yes it is more to do that, but it costs so much to do anything in the first place and it may be worth it. You won't know until you check.

To help with the imbalance between door and fireplace I would put a sofa perpendicular to the FP on the dining room side, and two chairs perp to it on the north side. Center a coffee table with the firebox to give a feeling that all is in alignment, even though its not. The coffee table should be 18" or less from the sofa, and the chairs, if further away from it, can have their own side table (round if you angle the chairs, square or rectangular it they sit straight. Try a sofa table behind the sofa and a tall piece of casegoods on one of the solid walls. Lots of art.

TV is mounted right in the traffic path from the front door. I would have put it where the bright pink picture is. Worth the expense of moving TV connections and repairing the wall if you own the home. Your coffee table is too big. It should be 2/3 of the width of that seat section of the sofa. Are there actual records stored in the record cabinet? I might think of storing liquor there so I could eliminate a piece of cabinetry. You could replace 3 pieces (liquor, record and TV piece) with one long piece for that wall above the dog bed. Let it do triple duty. Sell the other pieces on Craig's List and get a new coffee table. Eliminate the end tables; they aren't needed if you have a coffee table. Or you can eliminate the coffee table too and just do some "C" tables. Improve the view from the entry, and find another place for the kitchen trash can. Wall hung items should center 5' above the floor of hang 5" above furniture. Here's a chart for correctly mounting the TV. Sofa can be turned to face it with its back to the window. You can pull it forward for best viewing and add a sofa table behind it.

Try a chaise sofa and one chair in the TV room so you have room for kids play area. In the living room use a 3-seat sofa and two chairs grouped around a coffee table and use floor lamp flanking the sofa.