You guys are AMAZING- thank you so much for the suggestions. To answer a few questions... Our local HD is terrible - has a really small paint department and not a lot of choices displayed, plus the chips are always disorganised and frequently missing. Also, last time I asked, they said they don't do samples. So... especially since my builder likes Valspar or SW, I've stuck with those Lowes and the SW stores. Not that I can't look at colours elsewhere, of course - ah, technology! - but it's just been where I started and thus... Well, you get the idea :) I did go to a BM store and they were, as everybody suggested, WAY more knowledgeable and helpful, but we still didn't come up with anything - the taste of the "paint guru" was a little too trendy for me, so her suggestions, while valid colourwise, weren't anything I would like. Also, once again the extreme affect of light on my space (and the AWFUL light at the BM store - how can a paint store live with standard fluorescents?!) meant that what worked in the store wasn't as good at home. I'm pretty much giving up on green, particularly the sages - I love it, but there doesn't seem to be any shade of green which even comes close to working and anything sage turns a very depressing mud-gray on the walls, so I'm just going to abandon that altogether. Martha Stewart Wooden Spoon is the only exception and it's not "green" per se, although it does have a green undertone to it. In any case, yesterday I started working my way through the terracottas and bricks - to hell with it! I was gone most of the day yesterday, but that didn't stop me spending the hour between when I dropped the kid at school and when I had to hit the road myself looking at paint chips... The new contenders include Gingerbread Man and Tropical Nut (who NAMES these things?! It's worse than nail polish colours!), the former a deep burnt orange and the latter a dark brick red. I love them both. Ideally I probably need one right BETWEEN them and a shade or two lighter, but I think I may finally be getting somewhere; SW's Oak Creek may be a possibility - it's a medium depth colour with an orange undertone, but there's also a greenish something lurking in there somewhere too. It picks up the darker streaks in the wood, which might be just the ticket. I really DO prefer the deeper colours, no doubt about it. Stuff the beam line and the room divisions - if necessary, I'll just paint the kitchen a different colour than the DR and have done with it! I'm now thinking of maybe making the trim in the kitchen a creamy something to set off a deeper colour, and then use a satin version of that in the dining area (with dark trim?). Too many choices! However, I seem to be working my way - however slowly - towards something. And, as people keep telling me, if I don't like it... I can just change it!

The Glam Pad blog today has a post on Drue Heinz's house by NYC real estate agent John Yunis, with the information that it was decorated in the 1970s by Renzo Mongiardino, and most of the decor was still in place at the time of the listing. And that Mrs. Heinz hadn't been in residence for about 10 years, though the staff kept things going. The post includes photos of the house from the real estate listing, as above, as well as from an Architectural Digest feature in the seventies. Here's the dining room as it appeared in AD, with the following caption: "The combined Dining Room and Library is flooded with light from the garden. Dark 18th–century English pine paneling is brightened by floral curtains and upholstery, and an Aubusson rug.” … 'But take this particular house in Sutton Place. For many years now I have been working on old houses, with a great deal of pleasure. Really they have become my main interest, and practically all my work lies in the area of restoration. I want to bring these wonderful old houses back to life – to turn them into places where people can live comfortably today.'" Some of Mongiardino's quotes about his work in the house from the AD article: ‘I would like to point out something very obvious,’ says Signor Mongiardino. ‘The fact is that a house, whatever the degree or extent of its art and furnishings, is still a house. Today far too many people have come to think of a house as a sort of casa di moda – the kind of fashionable house that has to be done over every two or three years. Well that’s not my idea at all, nor was it the idea of the owners of the house on Sutton Place. Once you can make the house right, once it fits as snugly as a glove, then it is the way it should stay. Forever, in my opinion. The last thing I want to do is to force someone into following a momentary fashionable mode of décor.’ Mongiardino continues… ‘I want the houses I design to be warm and cozy, and I want them to look lived in. That’s what it’s all about, really. No wet paint, if you see what I mean. The greatest compliment anyone can pay me is to say that the houses I design don’t look ‘decorated’. Maybe it has to do with my training in the theater. I don’t know. But I do know that I want to create the illusion – and the reality – of permanence.’ ” PS Good eye, Rita -- that's an original Aubusson in the dining room : ) .

OMG...your bathroom is absolutely stunning! That mural is amazing. And I love your cats!! I have a Sphynx cat and his mind is blown that everything from our bathroom and closet is now spread all over our bedroom and other bedrooms while we are remodeling our bathroom. Something is in a new place....oh let me knock it off this dresser. Cats are such stinkers lol!

Thank you. I don't want the house to be gray and cold. I like that it feels warmer, even though I really don't care for any of it. The builder only offered a couple of options. I chose grey over beige walls and didn't like how cold the homes with all grey looked so the builder suggested these warmer options for everything else. None of the floor colors I posted with the cabinets are our options. They're all other brands and colors but it was all I could do with what I had at Lowes. I was hoping it could help me go in a direction - light, dark, warm, cool, brown, grey. I appreciate your insight about the darker floors. I hate our current light tile and really didn't want to get something even close to what is there now. My husband didn't want to pay extra for floors so we got the tile, it was all light. I was actually excited about them redoing the floors so I could get rid of the really light tiles. The light color was the lightest I could find when I was looking. I think a washed oak would look good and would be more timeless than grey. I just don't like light floors. I don't like the counters and if we don't sell, I want to rip them out. I wouldn't do that to try to match a floor. Ideally I'd like to change the counters, backsplash and cabinet colors. I really have my heart set on a pearl backsplash but it won't work with what we have now. Changing the kitchen colors is more for that than to match a floor. I definitely wouldn't change the kitchen for a floor. We bought the house 2 years ago so the builder doesn't have access anymore. No one can take photos in the house as we aren't there and I wouldn't feel comfortable giving a key code and having people in my home. Lowes has samples of our counter, paint, and cabinet colors but nothing that we can take with us to a flooring store. I ordered a sample of our counter but the piece I got was extremely brown and looked nothing like what's in our house. I need to narrow our colors down and order samples that we could take with us to Lowes but we're running out of time. They have to order the vinyl, take everything out of our home, repair the foundation, lay the new floors, and put everything back. They estimate we'll be out of the house 2-3 weeks. At this point, it looks like we'll miss 4th ofJuly and possibly the entire summer. I'm stressed. This needed to be done months ago. :(