You are describing just what my husband and I wanted when we built our house three years ago. I bought book after book of home plans and scoured the internet, but I realized I would need to design it myself. It's interesting, though, because what I wanted was a traditional, "rooms are rooms" floor plan without many fancy features. I was looking for something really plan - so I was surprised I couldn't find it. We ended up designing a really simple house - people always comment that it seems historic because of the simple design. In any case, we love the separate rooms - I like the way that actual rooms encourage a coziness in each and a way to differentiate mood and function by the space. Since I knew what I wanted, I decided to save the money on an architect and instead used a "residential designer" (CAD operator, really) to draw the plans up for me. It was a really fun process and the end result is exactly what I wanted. I was also able to design for architectural features that I knew I wanted to include, like three sets of antique, mahogany French doors I bought at a flea market. It sounds like you might like the freedom to do the same. (And, we love the French doors inside...they separate the dining room, living room, and study from the main foyer/entry hall, and we use them all of the time. Plus they are gorgeous!) I wish I could tell you where to find architecturally pleasing, traditional home plans, but I didn't find it myself. I did take a look at many Souther Living plans and the Fuller plans in particular, but still didn't find it. The closest I came was the set of plans sold by Historical Concepts, but the houses are smaller than we needed. They are really awesome houses, though, I have seen several built and they are full of detail and traditional design which it seems you might find pleasing, too. Best wishes to you!

Thanks everyone for taking time to read our post :)!

That really leaves you with the current arrangement, replacing the grey chair by the front window with kid stuff and leaving the floating living space opposite the TV. I'd really look into rerouting cable so the TV can be where the large art piece is. It's not usually very expensive and will be necessary in order to keep your walkway from running right in front of the tv.

Mama and Keith, I would get rid of the cabinet in the upper right side. Symmetry is overrated. Mama's layout is excellent. Here's another idea because I'm a fan of L shaped layouts versus U shaped. I've had both and I dislike having two corner cabinets. The other thing that bothered me in Mama's is I'd prefer the prep sink across from my cooktop. This creates a T shaped island. The arrows on both sides of the island point to the direction the drawers would open up. I think you'd actually have room to extend the island towards the dining room a bit since you only need a 36" path between the end of the island and the corner wall. I would do like I did in my kitchen and make the corner a drawer unit instead of a lazy susan. And of course below the cooktop and on either side all drawers. I LOVE my drawers. The red line would be upper cabinets that die into the wall. I did that in my kitchen and it's great to even have them as glass cabinets for glasses and some pretties.And yes, this is very similar to my layout. The only difference is I put my prep sink along the perimeter and my cleanup sink on the island. I did that because we're getting up there in years and for aging in place, it's easier to slide food stuff along the perimeter than carrying it across the aisle. Plus we don't leave dirty dishes and pots in the sink, so that wasn't an issue to us. (And I apologize to all who are tired of seeing my kitchen over and over again.)Note too I have windows on either side of my cooktop. I would not under any circumstances give up those windows. Also because I have induction and not gas, I could get away with the hood being the same size as the cooktop. Is it ideal and if I had more room, would I have instead done the wider hood? Absolutely, but for me, I prefer my spices in cabinets on either side of the hood, so it frees up space in the drawers for cooking utensils.