I bought my house in May 08 and had some ground-in ickiness in tiles/grout floors from previous owners. Knowing NOTHING about the subject, I used the Clorox Bleach Pen on some grout lines, let it set a while & cleaned it up (lots of rinsing!). It turned out BEAUTIFUL! Now, you don't want to use this as the standard way to keep them clean. Harsh chemicals WILL destroy your grout sooner than later. However, (for me) this was a really good way to just get the worst taken care of the first time, and then it's up to me to be careful to take care of the floors better than previous owners did. Also, I used the bleach pen because I had one around & hardly ever used it for anything else...and they're not cheap. 1 bleach pen went around maybe 15 tiles and that's it (but that was about the right size of the area I wanted to focus on). If I ever had to do this again, I would look into comet or oxyclean and old-fashioned scrubbing.

No LESS than 3/16. Your installer is actually giving extra effort to go that extra 1/16" smaller than normal (1/4"). The problem with large format tiles is that unless you're using rectified porcelain (and being that yours is glazed, I can tell you right off, it's not rectified), the sizing and out of squareness in the tile is such that to go any smaller than that would end up turning your floor into a mess. You'd see places were tiles were actually touching, just to keep them aligned. The thing that gets me is this is something your designer should be well aware of.

Laurie, sorry for so many pictures but I downloaded the pictures from the camera and just had it download all to Photobucket and I was too tired to delete pictures. Next time I share, I will send in less so people will want to view. But I appreciate your nice comments. That is why I sent the way before picture to show that my kitchen is a big improvement from when I bought my home and the mini blinds broke from raising and lowering them. The wall color was also too white for the appliances back then. Since the wall color looks nice in the foyers with my other tile called Akoya Bone that is a little darker, I feel once the tiles are down, it will look nice also. I am not sure how the blinds go yet but I will worry about that next. But I really am liking the tiles and feel they will enhance my kitchen with that outdated in bad shape Linoleum floor gone. I also love that little table. I was dating a guy when I moved into my home and we were looking for a small kitchen table for my kitchen and he kept trying to push me to go with cheap tables at stores that I hated. He finally told me that the deal for the table that was too big for the kitchen was a great deal and he will take me to Ethan Allen to show me what expensive prices are like so I will see that the table and chairs he is showing me were a good deal. The minute I saw this table and chairs, I fell in love and despite how expensive the set was even with the great sale this store was having at the time. I bought all four chairs and the insert to enlarge the table. I am able to add two more chairs from other rooms if I have 6 people at the table with the insert in the middle of the table and it fits in the middle of the kitchen. But I am glad I can then make the table small again for room to walk and cook. The table is so well made and is solid wood with even the side rails for lowering the sides made of solid wood. I went back the next day to bring one of my drawers to see how it matched and bought it. I have always been happy with my decision. I always wished my cabinets were made out of the wood that the table is made out of. Not sure what it(forgot since I did not know much about wood almost 14 years ago but remember it being a nice wood and it was solid wood and not oak so I was happy it went with my cabinets despite not being the same wood). I love the Wheatback chairs so much. I am so glad I did not try to save money and get the table that did not match my cabinets and was too big for the kitchen. Some things are worth investing in. Like you invested in the cabinets and put other purchases on hold. I feel that was a wide decision. I also love your tile floors backsplash, wood floors and baseboard trim in the other room. Again, thank you for being there for me and making me not feel alone during my home renovations. I can't wait to post new pictures when the tile floor is down and then to work on other parts of my kitchen project.

Weedyacres, I agree that a good tile installer does a dry layout first to assess the best way to install the tiles to create as little cuts as possible. If the tile installer would have started the diamond design at my door next to the rug area and worked his way forward so that at least the door area had tiles right up against it and most of the rug area did also, the window area would have no gaps and there would only be a 2" gap by the wall opposite the door. That gap would have been covered up by a 1 7/8th diamond cut of the tile in a few areas leaving the 1/8th width between the other tiles. The tile would have not fell out after being glued and having a quarter round on top. The installer started in the middle of the floor and then told me if he did not due the border I would waste so many tiles since he would have to put tiny pieces about 1/4th to 3/4th all along the edges. After he was done, I only saw spaces of 1 3/8th to 1 1/2 spaces at the door so he was wrong. He also forgot about the other wall on the other side of the door not having to have the tiles 1/8th from the wall since a quarter round would be covering the area. He tried so hard and I know I could have never cut those tiles so I feel very bad but in person, the problems were more noticeable. I also did not want a border in such a little area and I had shown him a picture of what I wanted and he told me 1/8th width was no problem for him with the spacers. I wish when the installer asked me where we should start the tiles, I wish I would have told him, let's lay them all out first and then we shall see how they fit and then I would have realized the tiles should start at the door. I was busy with ear plugs on trying to work but I could not work once he started the border since it was upsetting me. If I had a bigger foyer area, the border would have been nice if it was straight. Once the quarter rounds would have been put back on the sides of the wall, the tiles would have not looked centered anyway and the 3" wide X 12" boards would have not been the same size any more as on the other two walls without the quarter rounds. I now have no tiles and only cement floors blocked by gates but I could not let him do the middle foyer that had 4 doors since I do not feel he knew how to handle doors. Here is a link that might be useful: Album with some pics of the uneven grout lines mainly due to putting a border in that I did not want that created more cuts of the tile making it busier