Have you actually seen or felt any of the hardware you're considering or just taking your GC's word on it? I had my heart set on the Aubrey pulls so drove 65 miles to a store to put my own hands and eyes on them before I shelled out my hard earned cash, which, btw, I recommend doing with ANY hardware you're considering. I was impressed by the quality of the pulls and knobs RH displays on the little boards. (I was disappointed to not be able to rummage around on the huge wall of hardware like they had years ago.) I bought small samples of the Aubrey in polished nickel and polished chrome, a couple of other pulls DH liked, and a couple of different knobs. They all felt solid, heavy, and very well made. I went on to order samples of a few other pulls from different companies when DH didn't initially like my choice of the Aubrey. Compared to the other pulls, the Aubrey felt completely smooth on the handle part and heavier. Some of the other pulls were rougher and you could feel a seam on the handle from the mold or whatever they use to form them. Even though DH didn't like the style of the pull at first, he liked the quality very much. In the end, I chose three sizes of the Aubrey pulls (no knobs) in polished nickel. Of the 100 pulls I ordered (bought many more than I needed as I wanted the flexibility of changing my mind on sizes and then returned the rest), only one any had sort of little flaw in the nickel. Having read that some people in the past had trouble with the Aubrey screws, I sent a pull with the screws to my cab maker ahead of installation so he could decide if I needed to buy different screws. He said the ones I was sent would work fine on my cabs. He had never used RH hardware before, but was impressed with the quality and appearance after he installed them. It's only been a few months, but I'm having zero problems with the pulls. Well, except maybe my obsessive need to walk around wiping the small finger prints off so that they shine. :-) Look at any pull you're interested in IRL. Touch them. Hold them. Hold them up to your cabs to test the projection and appearance. Good luck! Here is a link that might be useful: More pics on this thread

Thank you all for your suggestions and commiseration. I've never tried the magic eraser...I'll have to get one and see what it does. We tested a spot that doesn't show with rug/upholstery cleaner and it didn't seem to do any damage, so I went ahead and worked on the black stripe. It seemed to come up pretty well with very gentle rubbing. In fact it was coming off in little tiny black bits, almost like erasures...which since it's rubber, I guess that's what it really is. It's not like a juice stain or grease stain that soaked in. The mark on the skirt is completely gone. The part that went up into the front of the chair seat was much darker. It is largely gone though I can still see the stripe as I know where to look. It's still drying but it looks 95% better. Fortunately, the fabric has so much nap that it looks like a brush mark in the nap. Also fortunately the ottoman is in front of the chair so you really have to look behind it to see it. After it dries completely, I may want to do a little more but I'm much more relaxed now about it. And I think I'll keep my dear hubby, clodhoppers and all. But he promised me, no more shoes in the bedroom. Of course we came back from working outside and wanted to see what the chair looked like, so there he goes heading into my room with his clodhoppers on! An alarm went off...it was me screaming at 120 db! ;)

Thanks PJ. Yea, those plumeria's are our's grown from our seed pod. It's been several years and we are anxious to see what color they turn out. Exciting. We have a Singapore that we just can't seem to get rid of the rust, but the other s are doing well. That is Rascal, we also have his litter sister, Ginger but she hates the heat and spends all her time inside when she isn't murdering her brother. LOL oops sorry got off tangent. now I do have one additional plant pot that is the same, so I guess I better mosaic that one too.

I think raee put her finger on what I found "off" about it. It would pair up very well with a warm wood stained finish, its the white and the dark brown tile that is just a bit jarring to me. Having said that, romy718's photo of the white cabinets/dark backsplash does look lovely, so who can say? Choosing a backsplash is hard, I didn't realize it until we had to pick ours. We brought home several samples of tile, all which looked like they would be perfect for us in the showroom. Until we got them home, under our lighting conditions that is. Then, we found a lot of them were not even close to working for us. Finally, finally, after many trips back and forth, we found the right one. Take your time, no rush to get the backsplash done. Bring home samples, see how they look in your kitchen, with your lighting. But, when you do finally decide, get what you love and don't worry so much about what others think.