Hi qlder, how funny that we had the same dilemma a few months ago... when I said to interior designer that butler's sink was too small (and it was miniature :/ ) she too suggested we swapped sinks by putting the double in the butler's pantry and the butler's sink in the kitchen... initially I thought great idea, but then I realised the whole point of designing an open plan kitchen was so I could be part of the action while in the kitchen, most of which time I spend at the sink... another point to consider is that if you have kids/teenagers, they're not going to bother going around to the butler's pantry and will just dump their dirty dishes at the nearest available sink, then you end up taking them to the bigger sink... I have seen display homes with double sinks in butler's pantry but then so was the dishwasher, and I note from your post that your dishwasher's in the kitchen so it would make more sense to me to have the double sink there as well... in the end we kept the double sink in the kitchen (personal pref & for reasons stated above) but as the butler's sink was way too small, we upgraded to a bigger 'laundry trough size' sink for washing pots and pans etc in the butler's pantry

When I was married, and we both left for work at the same time, two would have been good in the ensuite, but we had a 2nd bathroom so I used to go to that one. I used to clean houses and many of the houses had two basins in their 3 bathrooms! Pain in the butt to clean all of them!

Now, that's an idea. There's only three of us in the house, but I love cooking. I do it as a hobby, as well as for the three of us, and, I regularly have people over for a meal. Shall investigate half size dishwashers. I suspect a dishdrawer is the way to go as my friends had a single one in their little apartment.

Might be helpful if I talk through the parts we like and dislike with the existing rooms: - Lounge: gorgeous old fireplace and morning sun through the windows, great natural light. We spend a lot of time here - Dining: no windows and existing walls block off indirect light from the other rooms, thus why we thought it would be great to knock down some of those internal walls. If that becomes too difficult we'll need to at least do a skylight - Family: my least favourite room, mostly due to the coldness. As mentioned before, its really just being used as storage atm and long term plan is to replace it with something warmer/better constructed - Kitchen: pretty pokey, would love for it to be open with the living, dining and outdoor areas. Great view right onto the backyard from the current kitchen sink windows - Bed 1: gorgeous morning light, pretty happy - Bed 2: gorgeous afternoon light, not really used atm - Bed 3: pretty small, ok natural light. We're using it as a study currently - Bathroom: pretty old and feels abit cramped (that may just be the layout), but doesn't bug us as much for some reason, so happy to leave for later - Backyard: Flat. Very leafy and overgrown. 2 or 3 massive trees, but otherwise mostly shrubs and weeds. We're aiming to tame the weeds, plant some veggies and fruit trees and keep a few chickens for a permaculture/food forest kind of feel :) @oklouise - the block is about 16 m wide and 45 m long. From the front bedroom wall to the front fence is about 10m. From the "Family" room wall to the side fence is about 2.7m. We're in Sydney in quite a leafy suburb so I guess moderate/warm climate? And yes, we are looking into what we can do with the trees with council @Kate - thanks, we had actually thought about rotating the house initially but it turns out with the current orientation, the windows in the Lounge Room and Bedroom 1 get gorgeous morning sun, so definitely keen to keep that. We're doing laundry at the moment in the outdoor shed, which is fully plumbed and yes, existing bathroom is quite old but not bothering us too much at the moment. We're checking with an electrician and a plumber on the general state of things there Thanks for all your suggestions and questions so far - let me know if you have any great ideas!