Instead of having a small separate dining area in its own nook, have it continuous with the living area - no pinch points. That way if you have guests you can turn the table or extend the table into the living area - flexible space. In some of your plans you'll never sit more than six comfortably. Our dining room is 10'x11' and it seats eight with the table turned on the diagonal. We have to squeeze in eleven or twelve for Thanksgiving dinner. There's a nice big breakfast area in the kitchen, but there's a pinch point -can't join the spaces at all. And the LR is in an L-shape to the DR - but the LR is up three steps - arrgh! No flexibility! Which is what you NEED in a small space. You don't want this order of connection DR-K-LR but K-DR-LR. You could save a lot of space by having a much smaller, more efficient U-shaped kitchen. Save a lot on cabinetry and counters too. How many people will work in it at once? I'm the primary cook in my house; 8x11 workspace is plenty big enough for me. Your kitchen corridor eats a lot of space and those islands are really bulky - how about just having people sit at the table to socialize? I'd put the kitchen in one of those dining nooks in the plans and give myself a view while I worked. Your wanting a one-level house, and maybe having your parents live with you, maybe adopting or fostering children, makes me think you ought to consider an accessible bathroom. All your bathrooms look big enough if the layout is right. Look at roll-in showers. At least put in the blocking in the walls for handrails before the drywall/tile goes up. You and I have a lot in common with what we want in a house. Same size, passive solar, low energy use, healthy living conditions - I even want to move back to Western NC which is where my family is from. I just started sketching my plans - a two story, 40'x22' rectangular layout - the minimum number of expensive corners. I'm thinking of it in modular terms - on the west side, a 14x22 great room with dining area. In the 12x22 center module, foyer, stairs, and kitchen. On the east side, 14x14 study or ground floor bedroom, with an 8x14 area behind for accessible bath and laundry. Double pocket doors between great room and foyer and foyer and study - more flex space. Maybe have panels to close off the kitchen for more formal dining. Maybe a masonry heater in the GR? I know the interior walls will shorten the spaces - and maybe I can shave a couple feet off the edges. I've read though that you should build in 2' increments - eliminate some waste. Upstairs, master bedroom and bath over the study. Two more bedrooms over the great room. Window seat, gallery, bath in center module. Walls line up; the plumbing lines up. Strong enough joists and steep enough roof that I can finish a couple rooms in the attic if need or desire arises. So a really boring rectangular layout. Small by today's standards. I figure beauty will have to come from harmony of proportion, materials, colors. No mean, stingy narrow trim, doors or hallways. Actually there isn't much at all in the way of hallways. The foyer is a SPACE, not a passageway, same for upstairs landing.

Thank for the ideas, everyone, and for making changes, Lavender Lass. Funny you mention the great room fireplace being moved to the corner....my husband suggested that to free up a wall for the television (which I didn;t think would look right on a stone chimney above the fireplace) but I wasn;t sure if that would work in this room or might look strange. Apparently not! I would love to find a way to move the MBR to the end of the house (switching places with the WIC I suppose) to have windows on 2 walls, but I don't see a way to do that without needing to create a hallway, which seems like wasted space. I think the area where the steps are could be made smaller, and also think the MBR is bigger than we need, so may shave off some square feet there, too. One thing in response to some of the above posts - we are not looking to build a "budget home" and understand this is not an inexpensive house to build. I am a bit of a penny-pincher, not out of need, but just am. My prior posts were based on wondering if it is strange to have a fairly large, nice custom home with some non-luxurious finishes - such as higher end laminate instead of marble or granite. Also, someone mentioned choosing for interior vs. exterior. We have totally done that with this house....I honestly really don't even care all that much for the exterior of this house- but like the general idea of the layout and that is much more important to me. We drive a Ford Flex....we think it's really very ugly on the outside, but we *love* the inside and that is what sold us on it. LOL Sorry for the long-winded post!

So after thinking about things over the weekend, I found myself looking back at a plan I designed in 2008 when we were VERY close to building. With a few modifications I think it might still work. Its a farmhouse style, which I want, but the master is upstairs, which is not my first choice. But its a very efficient design. Its a rectangle, attached garage and all the plumbing on both floors is in the same quarter of the house. A lot of thought had gone into it, and I think I can live with the master upstairs. I will change the dining room to an office, the office to a media room, lose the wetbar, move things around in the kitchen/dining area and I think we will have a winner. I also might be able to get the full drawings from the builder. We surrendered a couple thousand in the failed deal so I spoke with home today and he thinks he can get us the CAD drawings so it wasnt a total bust. Fingers crossed. Here are the plans. Thought?

Thanks for all the great comments! Yes we have 3 kids, 11,13,16. So not as big of a concern about 3 BR's up in our case. We did look at a plan with a a MBR and aniother on the main floor but ultimately decided on this one, The window in the kitchen is south facing and is 3 2'x4' widows mulled. Hopefully that let in enough light. I do hope to carry at least a little light thru the large pantry window as well. It is 3'x 6'6". We will likely have that door open more often than one would think.. Teenagers arent the best with closing doors and drawers :) I like the idea of limiting front materials. I will have to think about how to do that. Thanks for the suggestion on the bathroom door, that is an easy fix. As far as the upstairs storage areas, those are only there bc the roof line creates them. Seems a shame to not put a door in to access an area for storage even if it isnt terribly useful. But I agree, I wont be. However we will have an upstairs heater in the one to separately heat the upstairs. Our basement will be unfinished and will function as the main storage area so storage isnt a huge concer.. Additionally there will be a workshop above the garage with 8 ft ceilings that isnt shown very clearly on the plans. The 4th BR closet is quite small but it will be for my 16 yo boy who doesnt need much room. We could look at chewing into the BR space a bit to make it bigger for sure.