I agree vinyl flooring would be better. The variation in designs, textures and colours now is vast, some you cannot tell from the real thing, but unlike the real thing is warmer and easier to take care off. I had some fitted recently that was grass effect my customer loved it and the cost was very reasonable. Look out on the web for some unusual vinyl designs, to add a unique /designer feel to your room. High street carpet shops only seem to stock standard (boring) designs that are 'popular' , be adventurous ' it's only flooring' You will be amazed at the choice available on line

Wow - I can see that you have some lovely ideas - however, if you want to design this sort of renovation yourself, you will need to research building regs to make sure your plan is compliant (as they are mandatory here in UK, not optional) - also I’d suggest you look up fire regs too as you will need to protect your family’s route out in the case of an emergency. Then I’d suggest you research opening sunrooms into the main part of the house that will be under thermal values part of building regs and then look into walkway spaces required in a kitchen and space required infront of an appliance and then look at informal planning guides for distance of table to wall and best equation for choosing the right size tv for the distance away you’ll be seated. Add to that some knowledge of the heat produced by the gas fire and how heat rises and there for it might melt your tv which would be a fire risk. ... Hope I haven’t bored you with all that ! With a little bit of research and some drawing changes - maybe a few more days required . Then it will be lovely AND safe for you and your family !

I do prefer Jonathan's plan. Just a few reasons:- I am not a fan of strings of rooms together creating lengths that you can see straight down, especially when at the end of it is a playroom full of toys. I think the playroom needs to be slightly segregated, although visible from the kitchen is great. His plan gives more longevity as you have a separate lounge, great for an adult retreat in future years, and also, the playroom then becomes a nice breakfast area when the kids eventually depart as teenagers to the dark recesses of their pits ( bedrooms ). Jonathan's dining area is much nicer too with a good outlook over the garden. A quick question...........is there a particular reason why you want an extra bathroom downstairs? In my experience, they rarely get used to their full potential. We have one, and, when our kids were at home, they moaned like trains and didn't like using it, so, in preference would hang around upstairs and wait for the main one to become free. Now, that they've left home, the only thing being washed in ours is the dogs. You probably would be better off with a downstairs loo and coat room, as currently there isn't great provision for all the coats, shoes & school bags you must have. You may think the Utility will get used for that, but it's too far from the front door as dumping your coats and shoes for most kids is an 'immediately you get through the front door thing'!

We were planning a kitchen reno 1.5 years ago. We needed to knock down a load-bearing wall between kitchen and dining room, built over a side door, remove all old flooring and install new laminate and kitchen units. The first quote a mate gave us was for £25k. Two others quoted £10k but were impossible to get hold off. Apparently, our project was too small for them. Finally we found a fab local family, who quoted us £7.5k for everything excluding laminated floors&kitchen install. We were to hire a carpenter separately and found a decent one which was charging £1.5k for kitchen installation and £1k (I think) for laminated floors.