Well, the chippies van was up the drive when I got home from work - a little unexpected. At first I thought that he was sleeping with the Mrs, but then I remembered that he needed to finish the skirting boards. He's done a cracking job - quite a few tricky internal/external corners, plus the corners not being exactly 90 degrees he was back and forth to his saw all the time. He really did a stirling job. It was 13 meters of skirting in total - which took him 4.5 hours in total (over 2 evenings) and it cost me £90. Considering I was origionally going to do it, it could well be the best £90 I've spent on this whole kitchen. I need to get a lick of paint inside the alcove that's pictured. Our little fishtank will be returning in there, but as it's out I may as well do it. When we get the bar stools, and dining room table & chairs I will update again. So: What would I change/add/remove ADD - Somewhere to hang the tea-towels. We have some on the inside of a cuboard, but they keep falling off. Maybe I need some slightly more expensive 'hangers'. The space where they could have gone we put a spice rack/draw thingie - that's probably better though. ADD - We forgot about the bin! Now we have our pedal-bin basically kicking around the kitchen. The Mrs has already filled the cupboards to maximum capacity so I'm having trouble getting an internal cupboard one past her. I think I may just fit one then deal with her later. The bin has gravitated to a semi-perminant place, but with the kids trying to be *cough* helpfull the wall is already beginning to get the odd splatter of 'stuff' where they just throw their food in the general direction of it. Last night I said 'Well, why don't we just put it in the utility room' - She shot that idea down instantly as she obviously isn't happy about the extra 4 steps that it would take to walk all-that-way into another room. Poor thing! Typical woman lol. ADD - At the start of the project I would have got the electricians to chase in another mains wire from the fusebox so that it comes out of the kitchen wall centrally to the back garden, then I would put a PIR Security Light in. I know that it's not a big job by any means, and I could, and probably will, do it myself over the coming weeks but if I could have had it without a wire on the outside of the house then that'd would have been perfect. Also, thinking about it, I would have actually got him to do it at the front of the house as well as he re-wired the whole downstairs with new fusebox etc.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><md>Weve now gone "bold" in our little cloakroom and totally transformed the look of it....we are so impressed

paint the chairs the same/similar green as the curtains. either use same fabric for kitchen blinds or use same green/white combo - maybe a stripe or something - you need to repeat that green in the kitchen - adding a big white bowl of green apples would help as a starter! I think part of the problem remains that the balance of light and dark is still not right - there's too much white in the dining and not enough in the kitchen. painting the chairs would help this, bringing the green into the kitchen will also help tie the two zones together. I'd also suggest more big white accessories in the kitchen area to speak to the white table. I'd also make sure there is a tiny bit of black dotted around - picture frames for example, the sharp contrast just adds a bit of edge and takes it all up a level. but looks much better already just having it all painted lighter colour and all one colour makes it all seem like one room rather than two, so it's all going in the right direction!

Hi we have a really large family area. But we are stuck on how to zone it decoratively, as there are no natural break in the room. Could someone help with this.