Get the professional sander guys in to repair the living areas and kitchen but don't go too dark with the stain as it will kill the lovely grain in the matai. I'm thinking a couple of tones richer than the timber knots showing in your photo, definitely no yellow tone at all. In NZ stepping on to carpet especially in a kiwi winter is so much nicer than a cold floor board shock!!! A nice area rug for the lounge and you're done.

We currently have a deck on the first floor over the garage. It construction is wood with a water proof membrane over, that is now leaking, with carpet that is used on boats over the top. What would be the lightest and best floor covering to use when we re do the deck?

my suggestions has the central entry and a small study off the living room...(twin desks provides more counter and wall storage and avoids sitting face to the wall) there's a generous laundry mudroom with direct external access, a bathroom with separate powder room, more space in the master suite with the window offsett for furniture and more privacy from views across the courtyard and reversing the wiw and ens allows for morning sun in the shower and the wiw creates a sound barrier against the guest room.. adding furniture helps suggest room sizes and there's various setdown spaces and extra storage throughout the house ...luckily there's plenty of room for more than minimum offsets to create a garden, alfresco, courtyard, screened spa room, entry, kitchen and laundry porches, garden sheds and drying areas and careful choice of building sizes allows for a neat gable roof with the extended eaves and a hip roof over bed 3 keeps the whole roof simple and economical to build

Hi Chrissie, Not sure if you are still interested in some feedback for your kitchen/laundry/toilet redesign after 2 months but as you seem to have no comments, I thought I'd offer some for your consideration. Before looking at an actual solution, I'd avoid having the toilet accessed through the kitchen and try not to combine the laundry and pantry. The moisture in the laundry is not helpful in the pantry if you have a dryer. It appears that you are happy to close off the back door so I will assume that is ok. Below is a plan that might work well for you. All the external windows are kept in the same place to save some money, if the fridge can fit where I have placed it. It's good to have access to the fridge without interferring with what's going on in the kitchen, but you could put it somewhere else if you prefer. I've put the door into the bathroom as you had adjusted it but put the toilet behind that door ensuring enough leg room. This can be as little as 1m or 1100mm given the space actually goes to the shower when the door is closed. The existing walls could work for this but might need adjusting a bit. The linen cupbd can stay where it is but move the HW cylinder back and make the cupbd deeper. Then the powder room next to this pushing into the space currently occupied by your pantry. The deeper from the door wall you make the powder room, the shorter the space can be but pace it out to get it working well. Tight powder rooms are unpleasant. 1100 x 1400 should work but it depends on how big the door, toilet and basin are. Put the toilet to one side centred no more than 400mm off the wall making more space on the door side. The laundry occupies the space where your toilet is currently but widen it right out to the window so it is at least 1200mm deep if you can. If you need more space than the window allows, you can make the window smaller. Having double cavity sliders will make the space more usable. The kitchen becomes a galley arrangement with the butlers pantry just being a section of the space that is screened off from the dining and living rooms. This whole space will be really efficient. There are no corners for the kitchen in this arrangement, which I love as there are no complicated storage issues. You can move around the sinks and cooker if you like and make the peninsular an island if you don't mind losing 1000mm of it and the storage below. Also if you are a follower of Fung Shui, having fire and water (cooker and sink) on the same bench is not ideal. You could locate one of these on the peninsular and if you have young children, probably keep the cooker on the outside wall. The peninsular bench/pantry wall can be adjusted either way to suit joinery modules for better pricing. I.e, use 450 & 600mm modules or wider for big drawers. You can have an additional sink in the pantry if you want it but to save money, instead, move the sinks down in front of the other window and shunt the cooker to the left a bit. That way, all the mess is screened from the dining space. If you need some structural support on the living room end, you can have a post or short wall on the end of the peninsular. If you want the kitchen accessed from the dining room side rather than the living room, just shorten the peninsular bench so the fridge is still easily accessed. Good luck with the renovations. Christine.