I bought most of my cast iron at yard sales, inherited several well-used pieces from around WWI (not kidding!), and believe it or not actually dug one frying pan out of the dirt in the backyard of a mid-1800s farmhouse I rented 15 years ago when rototilling for my landlord's garden. It was very rusty but once we got the rust off (wire brush attachment on an electric drill!) and reseasoned it it was good as new. I see them all the time at Goodwill and "Sal's Boutique" ;-) for just a couple of dollars because they're always all black and nasty looking, but they're easy to rescue. IMO the best place to buy NEW cast iron is an old-fashioned independent hardware store, where it costs maybe 1/4 what the fancy kitchen stores charge. Lodge is an excellent brand and the only brand still made 100% in the USA (and mostly from recycled iron!). There are many ways to go about seasoning cast iron and everyone is convinced that only their way is the right way and everyone else is wrong. :-) The ones I had that came from yard sales and other dubious sources got a run through a self-cleaning oven cycle or blasting-hot grill (if you use a charcoal grill, bury it right in the coals while you cook on the grate above) until a layer of ash formed on the surface. I washed that off and reseasoned them, and they might as well have been new. I had to give up my cast iron a few years back, which made me very sad, but I couldn't cook anything with them unless DH was home to pick up the blasted pan for me. My favorite pieces were my Dutch oven, the great big "chicken-fryin' pan" as one of my Southern friends called it, the flat griddle (best grilled cheese sandwiches ever), and a 12" skillet with lovely smooth sloped sides that made wonderful cornbread and Yorkshire pudding. Oh, and I had two ancient muffin pans which made the most glorious popovers. Popovers are one of my favorite things, but muffin tins and modern popover pans tend to be too thin to get hot enough for a good "pop". At least I gave them to a fellow foodgeek who would take care of them. All-Clad makes a stainless steel wok but I don't have one. My horrible glass-topped electric stove (I hate it hate it hate it hate it hate it) doesn't produce enough heat to bother with a wok so we gave ours away to a friend who actually cooks on the same iron wood-fired stove his great-grandmother cooked on. He fires it up blasting hot, takes one of the lids off and drops the wok right inside. I preferred the woks with a smallish flat bottom and the single rolled-metal handle rather than the ring and two little loop handles.

Westsider--Yes, I found a Pratt and Larson tile. I was supposed to get a couple of samples in the correct size and color last week, but they messed up my order again. I'll post pics when it gets here, unless they have another "miscommunication" at the showroom. The party was a success!! I'm not sure what happened with the people who made comments over the last months about arugula being a nasty weed and that capers were sickening, but everyone ate, and ate, and ate, and enjoyed the food! The woman who couldn't believe she ate capers stopped in her tracks when I told her that she also ate anchovies in that tapenade so loved so much. I received lots of praise during and after the party. Thank you all for your help. Most importantly, everyone, including me, had a great time. The group was smaller than expected as none of the husbands came, and a couple of families had the flu strike them at school that day. I think it all worked out for the best as we women just gathered in the kitchen to laugh, listen to Christmas music, talk, and eat apps while I finished plating and garnishing the main course. It was just how I hoped it would be. I ended up spending more time the night before on my son's project and having another commitment at my son's school that day, so I had to adjust the menu a bit to accommodate less cooking time. For apps I did a sour cream, herb, and cucumber dip with fresh veggies and blanched haricot verts and asparagus as suggested. I also did tapenade with crostini and Kathy Casey's sexy baked olives and feta. For the main course I did the cold beef fillet with sherry wine vinaigrette served on arugula with shaved red onions, haricot verts with walnuts and lemon vinaigrette, scalloped blue cheese potatoes, and the citrus salad with mint sugar. For dessert, I made the eggnog tiramisu trifle, cream cheese swirl brownies, and leftover lemon ginger cookies. We drank lots of prosecco, wine, and the hot buttered rum I made for the first time. The kids drank the spiced apple cider. I also had a beverage dispenser filled with water, lemons, and cucumber a friend termed "spa water." Sounds so snobby to me. ;) For compumom, here are the three recipes for which you asked. Eggnog Tiramisu Trifle http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Tiramisu-Eggnog-Trifle-108981 Tapenade In a food processor, pulse 1 garlic clove and 1 t fresh thyme leaves until minced. Add 1 1/4 c pitted kalamatas, 4 drained anchovy fillets, 2 T capers, 2 t lemon juice, and about 4-5 T EVOO and process until coarsely pureed. It's best fresh, but can keep a couple of days in the fridge. Cold Fillet of Beef with Sherry Wine Vinaigrette

Poor Vicky! Teeny tiny is too much. The sleeves and darts people are writing about make me shudder. Maybe you could get away with "kimono-style" sleeves that don't need to be set in, and elasticized gathers and other short-cuts. I have always enjoyed making doll clothes--both for my own dolls, of which I still have a few, and for dolls I ended up giving to young relatives and my friends' children. I would even use bits of real fur or leather or embroider them with beads...the sort of clothes I wished I had had for my own dolls as a kid. But none of these were as small as Barbies! More like 12~18" ones. A few times I have received extra thank-you notes from the recipients years later. Now that I am into quilts so much, I don't know if I'll be dressing any more dolls, but if I do, I know I'll have fun. That said, I do not enjoy sewing for humans, myself included (and I make most of my own clothes), so it was a real labor of love when I had to sew things for my mother when I visited from Japan the last 13 years of her life.

Sorting my thoughts about pantry -- I like to know what I have and be able to find it easily. It would irritate me to open up multiple storage units to find what I need or inventory what I have or need at the store. I'm kinda willing to open two and that's it. I would rather have stuff on shelves than drawers or pullouts for food storage. Don't want to be looking at the tops of the items (and I'm way to lazy to relabel them) or have to walk around something like an open pull out unit to be able to see what's in both sides. I'd rather just take stuff off shelves. Don't get me wrong, if it was a cabinet pantry v. no pantry, I'd certainly take it and be grateful. Drawers are fixed sizes and are just not as flexible. Want to buy that large size of cereal? Too bad, won't fit. Paper products, pet food, or stuff that comes in larger packages are examples of things that may not fit in drawers or pullouts. Some kinds of pullouts can be reconfigured, but that can be a pain - stop putting stuff away, empty the target location and adjust a shelf, bin or pullout, put the stuff back. In your original kitchen plan, the thing about using the dining room wall is that the food storage is a bit far from the likely prep area on the island - up near the range. This can be an ok situation for an organized chef - the type that gets out everything first and wouldn't mind carrying a basket to and from the pantry. But if that doesn't describe you, like it doesn't describe me, that kitchen plan is a recipe for a lotta walking and some frustration. Like 20 to 40 feet of walking for everyday stuff like a cup of milk or the forgotten can of chili beans. You can duplicate some items in a nearby cabinet. In fact, in the original layout, you have enough upper cabinets to duplicate most food products. Then the pantry itself becomes a place to store overstock and little used kitchen stuff. Lastly, everybody's interior image of "pantry" is different. My ultimate pantry is close to this... found on Design Sponge Each person will try to talk you into their internal image because it works for them. If you or your spouse has a completely different image, that's ok! I have no internal image of "butler's pantry". I'm kinda puzzled by why people who don't entertain a lot have one. Maybe if I had one, I'd figure it out, but I'm not in the price range for that!