i ended up doing white grout. it's really pretty, but i wish i would have done a very light gray. i'll do light gray on the other shower's subway tile i think. thanks for the advice, everyone. i'll take photos tomorrow. oh, and my tile guy replaced the broken tiles with no problem.

The home depot associate (tile specialist) suggested 1/16 spacers but use a flexible mortar to allow expansion/contraction. (I may not have said that correctly.) I will get advice on specific thinset and grout from my contact at the tile shop (who was a tile contractor). Thanks everyone!

so the large beige-ish tile is going on the floor and that patterned tile is on the shower wall? can you post a pic of the room? does that large tile come in a 2x2 or 3x3 size? it should. use that. u said it looks busy, but I don't see how. it's a solid look tile. same premise they've done here. used a smaller tile in the same make as the floor introducing any other type of mosaic will look busier. if your large floor tile is a matte finish, it could be cut and used on the shower floor. maybe have it cut in thinner, rectangular strips. they've done it here in the shower

It was done in August...lol. We're still trying to work out all the problems. They tiled on top of bowed studs. They mixed unsanded and sanded caulk in joints. The caulked in the wrong color. They grouted in the wrong color. They grouted in change of plane joints. Grout chunks and caulk were smeared all over tile surfaces. Bright white adhesive came up through the penny mosaic tile shower floor grout. This was new construction - so 4 full bathrooms with at least one of these problems. Most recently they recaulked with SPECTRUM brand caulk that was supposed to match ColorFast CUSTOM brand caulk. NOT EVEN CLOSE!