HANG ON!! First of all, 1/4" backerboard is way too flimsy without something behind it for wall tile. It's usually used over plywood for flooring underlayment. Secondly, even if it WERE okay for wall work, the sheetrock you're butting up to is 1/2". You want whatever you're tiling over to be flush to that sheetrock. Lastly, you don't need cement board for a backsplash. That's money wasted. Regular sheetrock will work fine, as you're finding out right now. No need to remove cabinets, countertop, or anything else. Cut it back as far as you need to, hopefully ending on studs at both ends. If you don't, it's not really a big deal, though. Simply screw a piece of wood into the back of the end of the good sheetrock, so that when you put the new piece in, you have something to screw the end of it into, so that it's supported, and the patch and existing sheetrock stay nice and flush. Once you do that, go over the seam with fiberglass mesh tape, and you're ready to tile.

Mow the grass with a very low blade before you start. Don't use weed mat - it is c#$p! Use very thick layers of newpaper - at least 10 sheets. Water each layer as you go. Compost or manure on top of the newspaper. Then lucerne hay - about 10cm, not fluffed up - straight from the bale in thick chunks. Water it well. Sprinkle with lime and blood and bone or superphosphate, or dynamic lifter - more compost or manure - water well again. Then a thick fluffy layer of oaten or wheaten straw. Expect a few oat or wheat to grow from it, but it lifts out easily and can be laid flat on top for further mulch. water well again. Leave for a while - more than 10 minutes is good. I leave mine from 6 to 8 weeks, by which time the lucerne is getting pretty rotten and mouldy. The newspaper should still be forming an excellent barrier even if anything is still alive underneath it. Did you overlap the layers of newspaper well? Why did you put down weed mat?

Just picked up another half a dozen homer buckets the other night. A pair of them are going to a friendly coffee shop who is going to give us their grounds. We will pick up and drop off a clean bucket to them each week, more often or add more buckets if needed. The other four got 3/4" holes drilled into the bottoms, around 30 or so I would say. These were added to the worm pile, I dump most of our kitchen scraps into these buckets along with adding crumpled cardboard or shredded paper. There are now 10 buckets in there. The six that have been out there I dumped into a small plastic pool to stir them up and take a peek. There was quite a lot of food left in near pristine state though loads that has broken down, no bad smells so its progressing nicely. Doesnt look to be tons of worms but for January outside I was pleased to see various sizes from small thin youngsters to large mature worms. The buckets are surrounded with straw and something I saw was interesting to me. The soil is working its way up into the straw and there are a good number of worms in it. This is the bedding from the chicken coop, nice to see it is breaking down at a decent pace.

Thank you kswl2. I wanted the pharmacy design to set these pharmacists apart. We had a very small budget. I found the storage shelves for the prescription drugs from a pharmacy that was going out of business. By the time we got to the front end of the store, there was no budget for lighting so I scavenged branches from a brush pile, hung them from wires off the suspended ceiling and purchased inexpensive paper lanterns to identify the waiting area. Here's a picture of when I just finished hanging the lanterns and trimming some of the branches. This could easily be adapted for a dining room.