Betsy I have a few recommendations for you depending on what you are looking for specifically. If you want something really unique and are OK w/ it on glass, then absolutely 100 percent I would recommend Designer Glass Mosaics. They are WONDERFUL, true artists and the work they do is absolutely exquisite. They did a mural for us in our upstairs guest bathroom: If you don't want glass, we used Stone Impressions for our kitchen mural. We custom-designed our mural using graphics they sent to us, although I believe you can send in any high quality images and they also have a designer program to help: Our kitchen mural: Lastly, if you want an inexpensive option of just having photos printed on tile, we used ImageSnap for the tiles for our dog shower. They also did a great job!

We have similar concerns. Our slide in is on an island right up against a 6" wall to an upper level. The upper countertop also hangs over a bit, making a perfect little trap for rising steam. We were going to use our countertop material as the island BS, figuring we wouldnt have to deal with steam, grease and other splatter weakening the tile over time. We ruled this out due to a few other challenges related to the depth of our stove. So, after mulling all the options with our GC, we're going to install a metal sheet behind the oven, and tile the rest of the island wall. If we don't like it, we'll run tile back there and take our chances. It should be done within the next 2 weeks, and will post pics when done. Who knew something seemingly so simple would become such a big deal!?

Is that the backsplash in the surrounding kitchen as well? If so, I'd do some tin, stainless, or something you can buy in a sheet and just put up there. I've seen ceiling material (the stuff to look like tin ceilings) cut and used as a backsplash. If you take the tile down and wanted to re-tile; there's a good chance you'd be stuck with having to re-sheetrock first.

The Great Expanding project - most of us have gotten hit with that one! At first I was going to try to refinish the pine flooring in the room that was going to be the kitchen. But when we opened up the wall to the den, the kitchen floor in that corner was 2" lower than the floor in the next room (an addition). We also found a soft spot in the floor, and decided we might as well see what is underneath. The soft spot was a poorly patched old hatch - this part of the house had been moved on the property so it may have had a bit of a cellar below it where it was originally. We also found where the old oil burning stove use to sit .. . With that mess, we decided to replace all the subfloor. Now that we had it this far - why not level and beef up the floor while we were at it. was interesting as the bathroom and bedroom were on opposite sides of the room with no floor. We had planned on putting down laminate - so put down appropriate subfloor. Looks pretty good. Except that after living with it for three years while we worked on other areas, we realized it was not going to work for us. So about a year ago - up came the floor and the underlayment. We discovered some water damage by the patio door and DH said "Maybe we should get rid of it" and my eyes got big- no door opened up a lot more possiblitites - So in Novmeber last year, out came the patio door. Two new windows and we could get back to the floor. We decided on tile, but could not figure out a good transition between the kitchen and dining room and settled on running the tile through both rooms - meant ripping out the carpet and underlayment we had installed about the time we put down the laminate. It was actaully the den when we put down the carpet - and the dining room was on the other side of the kitchen . . . but I'm talking about the floor here . . (see why we never actually get done with anything?) Hard part was finding room in the rest of the house for all the dining room and kitchen items - played "shift the stuff" many times. And we finally got to laying the tiles. We'd move things to one side, lay tile, them move them to the other side to lay more tile. These were the old cabinets we were goign to replace -from the old kitchen so they never were attached to the walls. So that is how the project to fix the soft spot in the floor ended up rebuilding part of the house. This is why DH and I are DIY'ers. Could you imagine what the change order costs would be if we had hired someone to do the work! Here is a more recent picture - the wall oven is about where the french doors use to be. The adjacent room behind there has a totally different floor plan now - our whole house ended up being one expanding project after another (fun with 130 yr old homes). At this point I think we've rebuilt as much as we left alone. This is also a lesson in why you want to get your project done quickly - when it takes years you have time to change your mind. Cathy