I think a comfortable distance between the island and the counter is around 42". It seems that you have only 30" between your cook top and the counter. I might be a little too tight. The wall between the entrance and the kitchen could be 4' long instead of 6', you would then be able to move the island a foot which would give you more room between the cook top and the island. Could you switch the location of the toilet and vanity in your dad's bathroom so your enter facing a vanity instead of a toilet which is a lot nicer.

Love the armless sofa-bench! Try using it in the center as a "cross-linking" piece between the sofa and chairs. That way people can sit on both sides of it, conversing with the sofa people and the chair people. Put the chairs where it is and use the side table from the left of the pic, or the one with flowers, between them. You'll need one huge rug to anchor the space or two smaller, and very similar ones, to put on either side of the blue sofa-bench. The other two side tables are too tall and too short for your seating pieces, so ditch them. Use your coffee table between the sofa and armless sofa (18" away from each of them.) Here's a chart for judging table and lamp heights as you'll need to work on that for balance. Please try this arrangement, and post by commenting and using the Attach Images button to add pix of the update. We'll tweak it on out from there.

There is a specialty lighting store near me that I am going to soon with photos to work on lighting at my house. I will show them your photo and see if they have an idea. Probably won't be till Fri or Sat but will get back to you.

First of all, I don't think that furniture is comfortable enough to sit and watch TV, so the TV should be remove from that room, the purple wall paper and the purple furniture is too much, you should consider another color for that wall and the furniture against the wall it doesn't look good. What is that room at the end is kind of dark and I cannot appreciate exactly what is the purpose of that room. I'm a firm believer in skylights, we have skylights in the laundry room, kitchen, living room and office, they make a big difference. (if you cannot have skylights (or tube lights) can lights are a great option. There are a lot of great ideas from everyone. I can't wait to see the after photos.