After several rounds of getting paint samples and putting blotches all over the house I have finally selected my colors.  On the bottom (below the chair rail) of the walls in the dining room I am going with Grasslands.  The rest of the walls throughout the house will be Bauhaus Buff ... or at least I am pretty sure.  I really liked the tone/color of China Doll but on the wall I felt it was too dark to do throughout.

Man it's been a process.  For the record, Sherwin Williams will tell you that you can get a color a percentage lighter.  They do not however calculate the % in the manner demonstrated here (which makes sense to me).  I had created a nice photoshop image to compare the original china doll to various %-ages lighter and thought I was set.  But when I got a sample that %-age lighter it looked identical to the regular color.

There were beige/creams that were too pinky, too gray, too peachy, too light/boring.  I am officially the goldilocks of beige.  Yay me.