Me, me, me!!!! I made 3 batches of cookies today, wrapped all the presents that I have bought so far, mailed my Christmas cards, and finished the laundry. So I am gonna settle in for the whole 3 hours and not feel one bit guilty. I didn't clean my house at all this weekend. But in my opinion, something's gotta give at the holidays, and I vote for housework. If someone comes and complains, I'll just shove a cookie in their mouth and distract them! LOL I volunteered for a very difficult and dangerous job this weekend...............I had to bring home 2 bags of Holiday M&Ms and wrap them in individual sevings for a class project. (Parents were supposed to send in individually wrapped candy, like Hershey's Kisses or Mini Reeses PB Cups.) I took it upon myself to do the job, since someone had to do it. Now, I have to tell you that there were defective M&Ms in both bags; and I, as quality control inspector, couldn't let them pass. I had to eat them in order to spare the poor unsuspecting souls who are supposed to receive the candy. It wasn't pleasant, but it had to be done!!! That is my story and I am sticking to it! (I still haven't eaten the M&Ms that I brought home and hid. And I only ate one cookie from each batch today - a record for me! LOL) Now I have to finish cleaning the kitchen and pack my lunch for tomorrow, then I can finally sit down and relax. Hope everyone had a nice weekend. Marci

Definitely the most boring one ever. I don't think the person who wins should also win the $100,000. I think Troyzan should have won that money. I wish Troyzan would have won the whole thing actually. I wish they wouldn't have given Colton the time of day. He's a piece of crap, and he's not remorseful, and he is a racist, and he meant everything he said. Kat was a pleasant surprise how she behaved. Maybe it was just because she was totally out of her element. And Bill was hilarious. Did you check out that suit? Too funny. I really liked him. I honestly don't know if I'll watch the next one if they bring Colton back. I don't think they should bring any former players back unless it's a reunion type deal and everyone there is a former player. I agree also it should be the final 2, not 3. And after this season, I wouldn't mind seeing redemption come back. They get everything handed to them now. Food, shelter stuff, tools. They need to get back to how it was in the beginning. Hard challenges, really have to figure out your own shelter, food, etc. And honestly, I'm not a prude but they need to put some damn clothes on these people, females and males. Come on fall!

I have this same problem. The kitchen has a walkpath adjacent to it which leads to garage and front lobby and basement stairs. We call it the "kitchen hall." DH does auto restoration and both of us are gardeners. Auto garage substances, garden dirt, and Labrador paws all create mess inside the house here and it needs to be stopped before we enter kitchen hall or balance of house. Deep into the project, I wanted the entire walkpath alongside kitchen to be tile and only the inside of the kitchen addition to be wood. This would have put stools at peninsula on a tile floor too--no fear of scratches! But...we ended up putting tile into the kitchen hall only as far as the desk unit which faces the basement stair area. Beyond this is the peninsula stool area, floor done in oak. We cut off the tiles in a line across the walkpath and put a horizontal piece of oak along the straight edge of the cut tiles perpendicular to the walkpath and then the new oak flooring runs parallel to the peninsula and walkpath and perpendicular to the oak divider. We wanted to downplay the transition so the oak board is not decorative. We did same at junction between tile and other floors, which are oak--a perpendicular piece of gorgeous oak that runs across side to side now fills a former outside door threshold. Same for top of stairway and entrance to dining room. Good looking but no ta-dah to call attention to itself. I have put Ikea stick-on felt bumpers at bottom of all table legs and stool legs which sit on the oak floor and so far it's worked (11 months) but I have to be diligent in knocking sand and such out of the felt when it accumulates there. Despite 3 rugs which lie between the front door and the working kitchen, there is a trail of dirt within the kitchen right now--I've been gardening. Gotta reassure myself that this is not a sign of anything bad, it's just how life will be when there's no formal front door and when real people and a dog live here. We shake rugs frequently and I sweep frequently but life goes on. The working kitchen part of the floor is oak--easier on feet than tile is and there is no ht or texture difference in threshold at the junction of kitchen hall and dining room with another oak floor--better for when I carry plates and trays past the peninsula and into the dining room than if the floor change were there. Sorry I don't have photos. Here's the desk area...imagine the junction just to right of desk. Photographer is standing by basement stairwell. Stools are to the right. Oak floor begins just where the peninsula Formica begins on right. Putting tile on an angle made the front hall a little more interesting. This tile camouflages dog hair--a benefit! [speculative mode on] This report is from 11 month vantage. Hope I continue to like the oak floor in kitchen. I started out with vinyl, excuse me, "resilient flooring" throughout the kitchen, halls, and lobby in my plan and once in a while I still wonder if I would have found it better in the long run. And...I could have called the installers and had it done in short order; this took us weeks of DIY and as I said, eternal vigilance is the price of oak floor.

Great minds...after I submitted the layouts, I realized I could enlarge the area left of the cooktop to 21" by reducing the cooktop/rangetop size to 30". We have a 30" cooktop now and were hoping to enlarge to accommodate multi pot cooking. However, I realized the cooking space on my current top is only 22" because of side controls and a range or rangetop with controls in front would give at least 5 -6 more so should be fine. I do think as we boomers age, more of us will ponder how to maintain our independence. As for the microwave--I do not use one. I had one but found it to be more of a nuisance than a help. I have been told I will never be able to sell my house without one but using your idea, the next owners could modify that area. Thanks for the encouragement.