New Windows...What to Do

In honor of all the efforts to be green, we are getting new windows. Actually I care nothing about being green...or rather, I was green LONG before it was cool. I remember being in elementary school and sorting through cans and bottles and magazines and boxes and newspaper. Then after we sorted everything we would lug it down to the local recycle place and they would pay you 1 penny/can or something like that. We always watched how much water we used because we lived in California, but this was all even before being green became cool there. I suppose we were green because my mom grew up on a farm, and that is REALLY green. OK, enough about that.

So, our house is old, which is cool, I like old houses. But we are trying to make everything more efficient, so earlier this year we put in some new insulation which was SUPER cool. And now, the new project is new windows. Our current ones are 40 years old, and last winter we felt a steady breeze through many of them (even after Dave weather stripped everything). So, yea, we need new windows.

The problem is that getting new windows seems to open a huge can of worms because there are all these options. So, now we are trying to determine what kind of windows we should get based upon what we think we want our house to look like in the future... So here's your chance to weigh in. The trim on the house needs to go, so we want to paint the trim/gutters, but are not sure what color. Thoughts? And then based upon that, what color should our outside windows be? Gray? Black? White? Cream? There are like 20 colors to choose from.

I think we are going to have to hire a professional, but if you have an opinion we would LOVE to hear it. Help!