It has Begun!    

I have just picked the professional I want to use and have we have agreed on a price.  I have already sent him a copy of my entire site.  He will begin on it immediately. Max time to complete according to him is 2 weeks.  

Once he is done and it is ready, we will load it and just like a light switch, we will all be in a new beautiful atmosphere.

Everything will be ported over, so we won't lose our posts or any of your profiles, PM's etc.   The one thing that may be sacrificed are the templates...I am not 100% clear as to whether they will port over also.  If the do not, then trust me, there will be an even better one than these.  All of design will be custom.

Also, the forum will be integrated more into the main site.  I believe that the login will be on the front page (which will be good, so as to get you guys to view the main site more ;) )  

I'm definately excited...but a bit anxious and worried.  I did see a few samples of this individual's other work and he did some pretty cool designs (IMO).  

In the meantime, things will remain the same.  The site will not be down at all during this project...the only thing that I can't do is do any additional mods or add-ons (such as more smileys or other script modifications).  

So Rest assured that the wheels have already been put into motion...