Dream Floorplan

So, I asked a friend for their advice on how to improve the floor plan and layout of the house.  Above is their sketch.  Can I just tell you how much I love it?  This is a 15 year plan, not something we can do all at once, but we can make changes little by little.  I love the openess of the kitchen and family room.  We don't have a mantel, but it is actually something I would love to create without having a fireplace.  I don't mind the faux mantel look, do you?

I also love the second hallway that is created out of the current end of the kitchen and the utility room.  I can definitely see this with some art on the walls of the hallway.  We would get a pantry combined with laundry in one room, and then a toilet with a pocket door through to the guest bath.  I think this is entertaining at its best.  The bedrooms largely stay the same except the last bedroom, with the lake mural, would lose the weird door connecting it to the guest bath.

Major changes:

 1) Kitchen.  Well, it is a gut anyways.  The cabinets are laminate and not solid wood, so even spending the time to paint them probably isn't worth it.  I haven't made up my mind whether or not to paint and live with the "upgrade" or to just save the money and change it first.  We will probably have to do a mini-step first and upgrade, then finally replace later.  To make this plan happen, we will have to relocate all the appliances so we cannot use the current footprint.  For the island to have water we will have to relocate the sink. 

2a) Guest bath & Laundry.  It would take moving walls, changing plumbing access to the sink & toilet (but not the shower).  We could definitely retile.  We would have to move doors and add doors.
2b) Pantry/laundry.  Completely relocate water & drain access for appliances and utility sink.  Building out pantry shelves would really help to customize the storage.  I would also be a perfect emergency room for hurricanes (living on near the coast, people).

4) Master bath.  We would be walling in the bathroom, relocating the closet door, and then hopefully tiling the bathroom, replacing the sink & vanity with dual sinks in a new vanity.  We also would close the door from the bathroom to the garage and relocating the garage door opener that sits on the garage side of that door (it isn't near the general entry door to the family room so we have to walk around to it).

The only difference in this plan (and I'm still open minded) and what I truly plan on doing is that I still want to relocate the dining room to the front of the house and have the middle room to the living spaces be the playroom/office area.  We want to have maximum space for our table, which has 3 leaves (leafs?).  It is my grandparents table and I don't want to get rid of it.  Right now the seating is tight without the table extensions.  We also have a china cabinet and sideboard to match the dining table and that means we need plenty of wall space.  If we moved the dining room to the front of the house, we could widen the doorways to the current dining room and the whole plan would feel much more open.  The new dining room would still have room for the piano that is currently there as well as another seating area for 1 or 2 with an end table and lamp.

Any of you commies out there making a 15 year house plan?  Hahaha!