A few notes:
In theory, the powder room / pantry / butler's pantry could all be used for kitchen space (or moved to the other end, compressed or expanded), so I left them in the floor plan.
The mud room will have a lot of windows, so I left that in, since we don't want to obscure the view in that direction. The north wall faces a condo building ten feet away, so those windows aren't so useful.
The south wall is probably going to be one foot further north than it's shown in that drawing; we decided that we'd rather have a bit more space for the family room below, and we can fit one foot pantry cabinets on that wall on either side of opening. That should still maintain the line of sight along the south wall of the kitchen to the mudroom glass-fronted door and adjacent windows (important because it comes all the way from the front of the house and will pull a lot of light through the house).
How would you lay out the kitchen to keep the fridge/range/sink near each other and maintain good flow throughout? Would you include an island? Is there room for one? Do we need some kind of snack 'station'? What else do you need with kids that we aren't thinking of now? Etc. and so on...
My mother has been designing kitchens for decades and has ironed out most potential kinks, I think. I will put you in touch with her if you like.
David, if she’d be willing to glance over it and give an opinion, that’d be great…
OK, I will send you a note on Facebook.
I saw a really neat thing in a kitchen renovation in the Farmington Garden tour (if you had more time, I’d suggest doing one or two of those, because you really get good ideas), anyway, they’d done a fireplace/brick hearth thing in the kitchen that had a pizza oven/bread oven in it.
Also, it helps to have a kitchen designer look over something, because they could see what you missed. If you don’t want to do electrical or water on the island, you could even make it moveable. I would definitely do an island. My aunt did a BIG island that was an eating area on the other side. She also put the sink in the island.
I almost wonder if you should switch the stove and sink. This would be more costly, (switching plumbing fixtures), but, depending on how you cook, might be more comfortable. I know I tend to take things out of the fridge, cook with them and then wash up, and that would be easier with baking and such.
Also, in terms of kitchen designers, I’d do things in mine that ‘normal’ people wouldn’t… like putting a stove under a window. This woman has some good tips on kitchen design, though:
http://www.thekitchendesigner.org/
I’d almost also switch the pizza oven with the desk, it seems as if it would be awkward to manage there, whereas with the desk position you could swing it onto the island or the table, right off.
You might also want to have a ‘craft closet’ in there too, for ‘messy crafts’ to do in the kitchen…
If you can get the sink in the Island, that’s probably your best bet.