Lav, an imagination is a terrible thing to waste....I'm glad to see yyours is alive and well. hehehehe

First off, it has pretty good flow. Not sure why a dining room wall should be important to those not living there, but so be it.

Your sitting area off the dining room is fine. But let me ask if you'd consider a pocket door (you mentioned it in Sandy's thread about her pocket doors), so it would not be in the way should you wish to leave it open.

And the door from the kitchen into that room....does it have to be a doorway, or could it also be an arch, like the one from the dining room into the kitchen? And no real door on it. It would be consistent with the other two arched doorways of the kitchen, including the one to the master suite/bath area.

If you have an opening on the wall above the sinks, it would serve to give you a view outdoors, something a kitchen located on an inside wall could use.

And then the door from that utility room/area into the mudroom....that one could REALLY be a pocket door, so it won't block anything in either space.

I'm glad to see you are hanging on tenatiously to your vestibule, and the stove is back in the picture. :) And the two bumpout windowseats, perfect.

You go girl. If this is your dream kitchen, I'm all for it.

LL I am confuzzled. Can you post the other plan B to compare? I can not remember for five seconds what plan B is and can not deal with going to find it. LOL Too tired right now.

The loss of the dinning room wall is confusing me. Is this the wall between dinning room and sun room?

Just tossing this in. We had an outside window and later the people built a mud room beyond that window. The mud room was really light and bright but the inside window did not gain much light to the laundry room area which used to be the outside room. It was not really large. Maybe three by three. But it was a dark window. It was wonderful to let air into the room from the mudroom with out having to have the door open. So just be sure you make your sink window big enough over looking your mud room area.

AND the arrangement of your neat farm sink in mudroom directly around corner from kitchen is PERFECT!!!! I had that in the one house that had dinning room table in kitchen and it was fantastic to stash soaking pots while eating to wash later. I had a deep laundry sink but yours will do you well.

Ready or not I have to post this I am fading fast and dinner is ready.

I knew you two would give me some good advice...thanks so much! :)

ML- The dining room has a lot of history and I can see why it's nice to keep it that way. In fact, I have to say, the idea has kind of grown on me...comments on dining room on Conversations side.

I like your idea about the pocket doors...and the arch is great, except the kitty box is going under the farm sink in the utility room...and it might be nice to be able to shut the door, on occasion. I'm glad you like the window seats...and I think the extra shelves will be really nice, too. Always nice to have more storage!

Shades- It is so confuzzling! LOL Don't worry about the dining room wall, it was in a previous plan. I think it's easier just to look at this one and see what you think.
I'm glad you like the big utility sink...that's one of my favorites and original to the farm kitchen. I'm hoping to have a big five foot wide window or windows over the sink, which will hopefully bring in some of the south light.

Also, I should probably mention that the front of the house faces southeast and the sunroom is in the south corner (light from southeast and southwest) while the table in the kitchen is in the west corner (windows face southwest and northwest). The 'manly pavillion' my husband wants, or covered patio area with BBQ will be off the back, while the front is for my roses and garden space :)

I understand completely about changing the plan. Actually, I think you are doing it the right way. I told dh that I wanted to draw up a really big plan of the kitchen & new room and tape it to the wall for a month so I could visualize me working in it when I worked in the current kitchen to see if it really worked. I regret soooo much the way we did it the first time, before we had even moved in here. And as I told you before, I am so afraid of making a mistake I have to live with for the next 15 years.

I think I like this plan better, though I really did like the big, open plan. I personally don't want a view of my kitchen from the front door, so I like this dining room next to the entry. I'm just not that clean and don't want everyone who comes in the door to know it. lol Also, I've gone to parties at homes designed like this plan and it is really nice to be able to set up the snacks in the dining room and let people help themselves and then come back to the living room.

I also like having a separate master bath. I'd probably rather have one big bathroom next to your bedroom if it had direct access from the bedroom and then have your 1/2 bath by the mudroom. Living in the country, that would be really important to me. We track mud & have a bathroom in the garage. That has allowed dh to keep the remaining hair on his head. Otherwise I would have snatched him bald-headed years ago. The man just cannot be bothered to take off his shoes or even look at them before walking in the door.

I wish I had pictures of a house we once had. There was a sunroom added to the back and they had left the original window over the kitchen sink. We took out that window and added French style windows. The guy who built our cabinets made them to match the cabinet doors and then put glass in them. It was nice to be able to open them to catch a breeze or talk to the people in the sunroom, or close them when I didn't want to heat that room or close out the noise.

I think shades has an excellent point about the convenience of your laundry room sink for soaking pans or even stashing dirty dishes when you are working in the kitchen.

Lav, if you have the kitty litter box under the utility/laundry sink, the door won't make a difference to the cats, because they will come right in over the windows of that sink area. Unless you keep them shut all the time.

Probably relocating the kitty litter box to the mud room will be the best option, where no open windows to the house interior will let them go further than that.

We are going to have a doggie door to the outside installed into the kitchen from the deck. It will have a barrier that slides into place when we don't want access, or when we go away for vacation. Raccoons will come in, so would snakes and squirrels....and of course anoles.

I quite understand the hair on thy DH's head, Marti, because we have the same issues here. Including a little halo rim of hair which means he NEVER DOES WRONG. I put down a long easy-to-wash bath mmt by the back door, so that he must take several steps over it and drop SOME of the dirt. Or those sneakers with the deep treads that drop little clay bricks all over the house as he walks along. I do not understand why he won't get flat treaded shoes to minimize this problem, or do like he does up north and TAKE OFF HIS SHOES. He would not DREAM of entering his Cape w/o his feet being clean.

Marti- Thanks for the nice words...and having the kitchen mess by the front door was a concern! (LOL) No matter how much I plan to be neater, the reality is a separate kitchen is probably my best hope for entertaining. I have a lot of fun cooking/baking, but I make a big mess, too :)

ML- The kitty box in the mudroom would be ideal, but our kitties don't go outside (only the barn kitties are outdoors) due to the coyotes. So, the mudroom is a good way of keeping them in and the cold air out.

I've been playing around with the kitchen plan, which is similar to Laura Calder's layout, but I think this works better. I don't have enough room for a deep island and with only 18" behind the cooktop, I think a raised seating area would be better and safer! What do you think?

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Laura Calder's kitchen...love that blue tile!

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Still plan to use the same backsplash, flooring, probably lighter blue ceramic tile countertop around sink (more of a soft, french blue) and wood/maybe some stone on the island.

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Is that real brick or vinyl? I really like it. Really, really, like it.

Marti- It's a vinyl floor that looks like brick. Here's a link :)

Here is a link that might be useful: Vinyl 'brick' floor

OH That flooring really is pretty.

Shades- It is pretty flooring...you don't see brick much, anymore and I really like the vintage feel of this design.

Anyone have any ideas/comments about the kitchen layout? I like the corner banquette and wood stove, as these are ideas I've had in other plans, but they fit better here, than in the front of the house. The chimney works better, too.

Do you like the raised countertop for the stools? My SIL has that, with a cooktop, and it seems to work well, but I'm not sure what countertop I want to use there.

Now that the kitchen is not open to the living room, I want to keep the brick floors, but I can do anything with the countertops...even go back to blue! I like the ceramic tile, but this blue laminate is pretty, too. If I choose granite for the island, I don't think it will go with the laminate, but butcher block would look good. Any thoughts?

Also, I still like white cabinets and bookcases, but maybe wood or another paint color on the island. Any ideas? Thanks :)

I like these white cabinets, with all the windows!

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Countertop...Arborite Laminate, 'Palermo Cielo' Did someone already mention this?

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Raised countertop...maybe with butcher block instead of black...not so dark.

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LL it is hard for me to comment because I am not a fan of eating bars in the kitchen.I know most love them. not sure if I mentioned there was supposed to be one here and I had them leave it out of the plan.

Love the banquet in the corner. Love the little wood stove.

Confused on the front left corner with two chairs. Is that the sun room now?

LOVE the blue counter top. I think it would look wonderful with either butcher block or black granite. Blue is kind of like green in being a neutral color. Think blue sky green grass blend with all flower colors beautifully.

I am so in love with that kitchen sink in last picture. That is a beauty.

Love the cabinets with all the windows too . Your kitchen is an inside room??? Are you still going to have it look through the mudroom or canning kitchen pantry. EEEKKK I am lost.

Can you link me back to Summerfields plan so I can compare. I can not remember for five seconds what you had and what is new.

I truly love that kitchen sink in the last picture too. It reminds me of a white limousine!! A real classy fixture.

It is going to be beautiful.

That's a beautiful sink, isn't it? I really want to find a double bowl vintage sink, similar to the one in Laura Calder's kitchen :)

Shades- You know, the more I think about the raised counter, the less I like it, because it makes the space look even more long and skinny. I've been playing around with different ideas, and now I'm thinking about putting the seating area on the side without the cooktop...and having shelves under the counter, behind the cooktop. Something like this, but not bright orange...and with shelves.

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Sarah Richardson did something similar on the end of her island in the farmhouse kitchen...but without the raised backsplash.

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The little corner room is a sunroom, with two chairs and short bookcases, under the windows. Something like htis, with bookcases, instead of the radiator and no door outside. I'd still like to attach a greenhouse, just for starting plants for the garden and a few 'hothouse' plants...maybe with a little table and a few chairs for a quick cup of tea. I think I've gone a bit garden crazy...and I'm really tired of these five to six month winters! (LOL)

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I don't know how people deal with five to six month winters. Having a garden room attached to the house would be a necessity for me, to keep from going nuts. I wish I knew where I saw the pictures of a working greenhouse in really frigid climates, growing veggies like zuccini in the winter, and tomatos as well, and only a step through a doorway to reach it. They built a good foundation, of course, and oriented it properly to keep it from baking in the warmer weather, brief though it might be. I'm still a big fan of heavy duty shade cloth, much more useful in south Alabama than it would be up north. I'm once again thinking about shading my poor blueberry plants from the searing heat of this drought.

The picture you show of the sunroom and the wrought iron lace chair and table remind me of old southern style. I found such a table and chairs at a salvage yard, and for now it is up in Massachusetts waiting to move south later this year. Let me see if I can find a picture of it for you.

Your picture of the Sarah Richardson style kitchen is always an inspiration. For my kitchen, I've copied the way she has cabs built above the French door fridge, but not full height cabs on either side. Just low ones. I want windows on either side if at all possible. But we'll see how much storage space we have.

About looking skinny, my MoccasinLanding kitchen was 11 x 17. I kept it from looking skinny by eliminating wall cabs on the long dimension, and having wall cabs on the narrow ends. I had a rolling small m/wave cart as an island with a pot rack overit, on a pulley to raise out of the way as needed, and I put a short bar in an L-shape near the cook top, enough room for 2 stools, the bar was regular counter height not the 42" height, and had no backsplash at all. I also installed on the long walls open shelving which let me store things there, but did not close in the walls as solid wall cabs would do. Those photos from 2003-4 are on another computer I believe, unless I run across the CD I transferred them to. That was the biggest kitchen I ever had, and it had its problems but I liked it.

ML- I love your sunroom picture! That's exactly the type of look I want, light and airy with lots of plants and a little old world/romantic :)

My dad is from South Carolina and I lived in Arkansas when I was little, so although I love snow and the change in seasons...after about three to four months, I've had enough winter and start needing sunshine and flowers!

I'd like to see your kitchen pictures, if you do find them. Thanks to you, Shades and Marti, I've made a few more changes to the plan, trying to incorporate some of the ideas and suggestions. It's so helpful to have other people's input and I want to thank you all so much!

Thanks to all your suggestions, I've made a few changes. I left the smaller sunporch/study...but added a greenhouse, similar to ML's above :)

It's 12' x 20' and has a sink against the washer/dryer wall with cabinets and windows on three sides. It's mainly for growing/starting veggies, flowers and herbs, but there's enough room for a few larger hothouse plants and a small table and chairs (like ML's).

The deck on the back is more of an uncovered porch (although I'd love to add a pergola over it) with access from the mudroom and greenhouse, to the back yard. There will be a patio below, for most of our entertaining needs.

The lower left corner faces south, while the front of the house faces southeast. Each square on the graph paper is 2'. Any other ideas/suggestions? I really appreciate all your input :)

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