I know that engineers and architects get certified in everything from building codes to AutoCAD, don’t get me wrong. I just don’t know if they are asked on a nearly daily basis to be fluent in a new tool. From one marketing tactic to the next, there is always a new piece of management software, syndication software, creative software, Cloud Whozit, and SaaS Whatzit. So, when a vendor takes the time to offer a certification, you know they are in the business of user proficiency and user adoption. Silverpop knows that to beat their competitors at Marketo and Eloqua, they need a legion of loyal fans who are rock-star proficient at using their software to make marketing magic. If I weren’t in the weeds with the system every day trying to prove its value to my company, I might not have even bothered. I found the certification process thorough and useful in learning many corners of the software I might not have explored otherwise. With that knowledge, I just might be more ambitious with my marketing than I would have before. Mission accomplished, Silverpop. You have my thanks for the Certification challenge, and I have this handsome certificate not suitable for framing to adorn my blog and resume.

Let me just say, that I have a new appreciation for a great many things. Here are my top 10.

10. My Wife, the Maid. It’s not that I don’t clean up things around the house, I really do. It’s just that when you work with a partner on household stuff, it doesn’t seem nearly as repetitive. You don’t have to pick up the same exact kid mess 3 times. She usually picks it up twice and I’ll get it once.

9. Groceries. You know what? They don’t magically appear. Somebody around here actually goes to the store and buys them. Huh.

8. My Wife, the Bill Payer. These things just keep appearing in the mail. Not that I thought money magically disappeared from my account. Or, did it? hmmm…

7. Executive Chef and Meal Planner. This actually should be my #1. The fact that I married someone who has something on the table every night to delight me, is an absolute treasure. I will forever listen and participate when she says “What should we have for dinner?”. That is one of the more stressful questions, I now realize. Granted she has so much more practice than me that the answer comes more quickly. Still…what a pain!

6.  Chief Bottle Washer. Those darn dishes don’t clean themselves, despite the farcical idea of the “dishwasher”. Shame on whoever invented this “magic device that cleans your dishes”. You rinse every dish anyways – saving them in a special place for days. Then you have a massive pile to unload and put away.

5. Chief Laundry Officer Ditto. Except that my jokes about how I don’t know how to use the washing machine will probably never fly. I’m very good about putting my laundry away. I didn’t realize how much disipline there is in actually getting it to that point.

4. Taxi Driver. The kids and me have to be or want to be in 10 different places per day. Hello car, I really never knew where all your gas went. NOW, I know.

3. Spare Time. There is so very little of it for things like, oh I dunno…blogging, or working out or being a Cubmaster. Clearly running a house with 2 people is far more efficient if anyone has ambition to accomplish anything outside of keeping the home in one piece.

2. Work And… The fact that someone would run a household and have a job, and still have a smile is nothing less than remarkable.  I’ll be just fine, and I’m betting I could last a few weeks. I also know that running the house takes practice, and I’d find ways to be more efficient.  Still, though that kind of multi-tasking is not to be underestimated.

1. My Best Friend. It’s just strange. When you are so used to sharing the hustle and bustle, and talking about it at the end of the day, things can seem very quiet. I have the oddest thoughts. I think about the things that Tricia takes care of, as I go about taking care of them for a week. I think about what it would be like if she weren’t here. Yes, morbid. Of course I would adapt. People do it all the time. But, our life together is soooo much better as two. So much more efficient, so much more interesting. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder.

Let me say, this experience is absolutely awesome. My kids were looking forward to the change in parenting from Tricia being the primary homemaker to me. I’ve done some things differently (like allowing them to do hot tub snow angels as an example), but I do find myself saying the same things that I often think my wife harps on too much. It’s as if all of the practice she has in her role has led her down a certain path. I could see myself there too. I’ve learned a lot this week. I could totally do this. You know what? I don’t really want to. I’ll be happy when she’s home, and I’ll have a different perspective on how great she is at her jobs.

October 13, 2011 – 1pm Bass-Cauthen Funeral Home

Good Afternoon. I’m Kris Rzepkowski, nephew of Wendy Vosper (Rzepkowski). Today we celebrate the life of a dear friend, beloved wife, cherished sister, daughter, and adored aunt. When I say celebrate, I mean it. We’re remembering a person for whom life was full of celebration, joy and fun.

Wendy has been my kindred spirit from birth. She became my aunt on her 10th birthday April 2nd 1975, giving us a closeness in age that almost made her my big sister.  When I was a kid, she was the “cool aunt” who would play with my sister, Lindsey and me when our parents had enough – Game after game, coloring book after coloring book. Though Aunt Wendy never had kids; her nieces, nephews, and great-nieces and nephew know that the Snoopy-loving, chocolate sharing, stuffed animal squeezing, Disney worshipping, always smiling lady was their “cool aunt” too.

I remember that Wendy worked at Wendy’s (the fast food joint). I thought for sure that she owned the place, so I begged grandma to take me there for special treatment. I was impressed when she took my order for a Frosty and the change from grandma’s dollar came spitting out of the coin return. As we grew older, Aunt Wendy became a stunning beauty who always had a boyfriend. That didn’t stop her from taking me with her on her dates to the Putt-Putt. Through my most awkward teenage years, she was the one who built me up and called me handsome, even though I always felt like such a dork. That kind of encouragement from someone so beautiful on the outside showed me what I always knew – how beautiful she was on the inside. In adulthood, Aunt Wendy remained a positive influence on my life. She, along with my grandmother has the most faith-filled lives of anyone I know. Through the ups and downs of money, marriage, and jobs I could always talk to Aunt Wendy about anything. After we talked, we always came out the other side knowing that we were there for each other.

I can tell from so many of Wendy’s friends from work and other acquaintances here in South Carolina that she bestowed the same kind of blessings on everyone. She genuinely cared for other people and wanted only to nurture and build others up because that brought her so much joy.

Wendy’s brothers, Neal, Dick and Terry can tell you a tale of the little ski bunny in their family. She started as a good excuse to keep her dad “Lefty” at the bottom of the hill watching over her. Very quickly though, she had the old man schussing, and her 3 proud brothers racing to keep up. Wendy could smoke people 5 years older than her. Lefty is probably at the top of the hill right now learning a new trick from Wendy, and she is likely giving her dad a huge welcome home hug.

Grandma Esther reminded me of how close she and her only daughter were. They loved to travel together and shop together. If the sun could kiss their skin and the shops accepted Visa from San Diego to Orlando and everywhere in between, the 2 lady Rzepkowski’s could be found spending time together. Wendy was the only one who could say “Mom, what’s with that blouse? You look like you got eaten by an elephant.” and could get a smile. Wendy wanted to go next to Oregon with Grandma. It’s too bad Oregon won’t get to add that party to their tourism budget.

Ian, I know that when you were married in 2007 to Aunt Wendy, that your song was God Blessed the Broken Road that Brought me straight to you. Later that year, cancer put a speed bump in that road. Just know how thankful we are that you were there for Wendy, and our hearts grieve for you now as you’ve lost your partner in this journey. God Bless your future.

You know, Christmas was Wendy’s day. For weeks beforehand she would decorate grandma’s house, creating elaborate Christmas tree themes year after year. Then there was the shopping. Wendy loved the chase, even willing to accompany Uncle Neal on his Christmas Eve last-minute missions. She made sure there was something under the tree for everyone, usually applying her keen sense of style. From grouchy grandpa to all the girly girls, “clothes for all” was her motto. Each gift she wrapped with so much tape that you had to tug-of-war to get inside. On Christmas morning she played Santa’s favorite elf, delivering gifts and smiling that gorgeous grin as we all enjoyed creating a mountain of bows and crumpled wrapping paper.

In December 2010, Wendy rallied from an extremely difficult run of cancer treatment. Though she could barely leave her own bedroom, she, Ian and grandma made the 12 hour trek to Rochester NY to join the family for what would be our last Christmas together. It was like 3 years of hell had never happened. She still had her smile, still had her Christmas spirit.

We all knew that Wendy was struggling, but her Rzepkowski stubborn-ness wouldn’t let us know how bad it hurt for her really. That’s called dignity my friends. We are all so proud of you Aunt Wendy for the dignity and grace that you showed against a disease you didn’t deserve. Somewhere, up there you are smiling down on us, knowing that you won. You beat it, and I love you!

Aunt Wendy was a closet poet. When she wanted to show her mom and dad how much they meant to her she would create poems. I do not have that same gift, but in closing I’d like to share the lyrics of a poem written in the form of a song by Michael Jackson. It’s called Gone to Soon.

Like A Comet
Blazing ‘Cross The Evening Sky
Gone Too Soon

Like A Rainbow
Fading In The Twinkling Of An Eye
Gone Too Soon

Shiny And Sparkly
And Splendidly Bright
Here One Day
Gone One Night

Like The Loss Of Sunlight
On A Cloudy Afternoon
Gone Too Soon

Like A Castle
Built Upon A Sandy Beach
Gone Too Soon

Like A Perfect Flower
That Is Just Beyond Your Reach
Gone Too Soon

Born To Amuse, To Inspire, To Delight
Here One Day
Gone One Night
Like A Sunset
Dying With The Rising Of The Moon
Gone Too Soon
Gone Too Soon…

I post this here only because so many people from my family and those who visited the service asked me to.

Aunt Wendy and me, fuzzy together in 2008 after she had undergone some chemo.

She was well enough to even come up north from South Carolina to share her final Christmas with us. Christmas…that was Aunt Wendy’s holiday. NOBODY loved sharing it more than her.

Aunt Wendy, Ian and the kids sharing happy times at Christmas 2010

I called her 2 weeks ago and we talked for an hour about life. She still had big plans and was happy to hear that so many of mine have come to fruition. Tonight we drive 13 hours to South Carolina to say our goodbyes. I’m looking forward to seeing her one last time. It just doesn’t seem fair really…because she’s gone too soon.

Gone Too Soon – Michael Jackson

Like A Comet
Blazing ‘Cross The Evening Sky
Gone Too Soon

Like A Rainbow
Fading In The Twinkling Of An Eye
Gone Too Soon

Shiny And Sparkly
And Splendidly Bright
Here One Day
Gone One Night

Like The Loss Of Sunlight
On A Cloudy Afternoon
Gone Too Soon

Like A Castle
Built Upon A Sandy Beach
Gone Too Soon

Like A Perfect Flower
That Is Just Beyond Your Reach
Gone Too Soon

Born To Amuse, To Inspire, To Delight
Here One Day
Gone One Night

Like A Sunset
Dying With The Rising Of The Moon
Gone Too Soon

Gone Too Soon

Kris's Apple iPhone 3G with tethered extra battery

So the glorious launch day has arrived, Apple. All I have to say to you is that this thing better have a decent battery in it (preferably replaceable), and you better think twice before forcing some shiny new iOS onto it before the end of my 2 year contract. Thanks for your time.

Stripping a Deck With Chemical Stripper and a Pressure Washer

The first step in this project was to learn how to use a pressure washer. My father-in-law let me borrow his Craftsman pressure washer. The operation is fairly simple. You fill the gas tank with gas, hook up a garden hose to the pump, and decide what “degree” tip you are going to put on the business end of the wand. Each successive tip has a narrower pattern and therefore delivers more pressure to the surface you are trying to strip. I gave the wand a few tries over my deck and realized very quickly that, even on the highest pressure, I was going to have a hard time getting the finish off of the wood. Plus, I would probably destroy the surface of it causing more harm than good. So, I decided that I would use a chemical stripper to help release the finish from the wood. I bought some Zinsser DeckStrip from Lowe’s and a pump-style garden sprayer from Harbor Freight to easily apply the stripper.

Craftsman 2500 PSI Pressure Washer

Zinsser DeckStrip

1.25 Gallon Garden Sprayer

Prior to stripping I masked my house siding and all of the plants around the deck with sheets of clear plastic drop cloth. I used the sprayer to apply the stripper to the floor boards, and eventually used a brush to spread it in a thick, even coat. After letting the stripper (applied to manageable areas) set for 20 minutes it was time to fire up the pressure washer. You’ll see in the photos that I used every safety precaution to protect myself. I used rubberized chemical gloves that went 2/3rds up my arms, rubber boots, safety goggles, ear protection (for the annoying din of the pressure washer motor), and even a breather (for the combination of gas fumes and airborne stripper). Stripping the floor using this technique probably took me 8 hours. It was the spindles, of course, that really slowed things down. They easily took another 3 days worth of work. Remember, after applying the stripper, there’s 4 sides to every spindle, plus the railing and all of the vertical 4×4 posts.

Sanding the Deck: How to Remove the Yuck after Stripping

Only a few hours into the chore of stripping the deck with a pressure washer, I already knew that it wasn’t going to be good enough. After the water dried there were still flakes of stain on the wood, and much of it looked “furry”. The wood fibers lifted due to the force of the water pressure, and the wood was anything but uniform in color. I knew and dreaded the only solution…to sand the deck.

The prospect of having to revisit every square inch of the deck yet again, only this time with a tedious sander just made this project more irritating. There was no turning back. I wasn’t about to tear it down, light a match to it, or just stain it over as is. I decided to bring out the heavy equipment. I went to Home Depot and rented a random orbital floor sander that would at least take care of the floor. Along with the sander, I bought plenty (10 sheets) of the coarsest grit sandpaper you could get for the unit. Much to my surprise, a quick 4 hour rental was enough to do the entire floor surface and the steps to the deck.  The difference between the sanded and unsanded deck were dramatic.

The only thing left were the spindles and railings. What a pain! For this I used a triangle detail sander from Harbor Freight. I also ordered 100 sheets of sandpaper (from Amazon because bulk is WAY cheaper). Trust me, you don’t want to be stretching worn out sandpaper when you are on the 100th spindle. After 3 days of sanding spindles that love to retain the finish (vertical spindles don’t see nearly as much weather as the floor), the hard work was done. I took the time to sand with medium grit sand paper, all of the railings where your hands touch. This gave the wood a buttery soft feel to the hands and really made a difference in the end result of the project. From here, I waited for 3 days of bright sunshine to dry out the wood.

Home Depot Floor Sander Rental

Oscillating Detail Sander

40 Grit Triangle Hook and Loop Sandpaper

Refinishing the Deck in Oil-based Stain

After the deck was stripped and sanded, the last thing I wanted to do was make a mistake in the new finish choice. I knew I was going to go oil-based because the water-based was such a disaster. Much beyond that I was unsure. I decided to head to anyplace but Sherwin-Williams for advice this time. I ended up at the contractor’s choice in Webster, NY Hadlocks’s House of Paint. I considered a few of the products they carried until finally deciding on Duckback Transparent Wood Stain (Natural #1910). The stain has a slight honey colored tint to it, but otherwise allows the natural beauty of the wood to show through. The theory goes that this stain penetrates into the wood almost like glove oil does into a catcher’s mitt. The protection therefore isn’t just on the surface and should hold up for a few seasons. The best part is that I should never have to strip it off again. I can clean it and apply a new coat in the future, but my stripping days should be behind me – we’ll see.

The application of the stain was really very easy. I applied it with brushes meant for oil-based stain. When my trusty assistant showed up to help finish the job, it went even faster. It probably took a total of 12 hours to apply the new finish

The Results

I must say that we have been very happy with the results so far. The sanded wood followed by an oil-based finish has given the wood a softness under foot that really is wonderful to be on during the summer. I’m really happy with the look of the more natural wood grain than my previously heavy pigmented stain. The deck looks more fresh. I’ll be curious to see how it holds up for the next couple of years. There has been some fading of the deck over the summer as the sun has baked it, but overall not too bad. I’ll post an update as I see the continued performance of the finish. If anyone has ever used this product or has deck stripping and staining war stories they’d like to tell, feel free to entertain us in the comments.

Here’s a little taste…

Help build a top professional services brand using your talents as an online marketing expert. Hudson North America is seeking a skilled and motivated digital marketer to work with our line-of-business marketing managers and our web development team to build programs that achieve business results.

Catch the market upswing as we re-position our websites onto DotNetNuke, reposition our brand as Trusted Advisors globally, and position your interactive abilities as a centerpiece of the digital marketing department of the future. If you know more about thought leadership than online shopping carts, please apply!

If you know that you can rock this job, or you can refer someone else who will, please have them Apply. I will see every resume that comes into the Job Posting.

I had the pleasure of attending the 2011 Silverpop Client Summit. This was my first summit as we are a relatively new customer for Silverpop. First, let me just say that Silverpop put on a heck of an event.

Memorable Event Details

Here’s some things that made the event planning/production itself memorable

• Any truly great event has great keynote speakers.  Stephen Dubner of Freakonomics fame, and Gary Vaynerchuk of passionate social media fame knocked their keynotes out of the park. It was a nice touch that their latest books were made available for free to all attendees.
• It sounds stupid, but the endless promotion of the hastag #SPOP11 and displaying the tweets from it up on the big screen was really fun. It was fun to tweet and get your words up in front of a crowd in seconds.
• A great venue. Hotel Intercontinental Buckhead had plenty of space, and outstanding food and accomodations. The staff was super professional.
• Fun after hours events at World of Coke and listening to Girlz Girlz Girlz rock it.
• Very well-planned learning tracks for B2B and B2C customers kept separate.
• Plenty of networking time between presentations made making business connections very easy.

Now, My Marketing Takeaways

• Silverpop has an outstanding staff of product strategists and support people that really are leading the field of Marketing Automation Software. I have a much higher confidence level that we made the right system selection after having attended the event and meeting the people behind the product. From the CEO, Bill Nussey to Lead Product Strategist Bryan Brown to product ninja John Field, these guys really have great vision to lead toward the future and understand the problems we as marketers all face in trying to get there.
• Not only do they know their own product, but I feel way better about how well they understand Salesforce.com. Engage 8.3 is a far superior product to Engage B2B in how well it integrates with Salesforce.
• I am reassured by presentations from analysts at Sirius Decisions (Meg Heuer) that all of this pain and suffering in trying to migrate to a new sales and marketing model aligned process-wise and powered by marketing automation and CRM tools is defintely the right direction.
• I also learned that there are plenty of other organizations out there that share the challenges of getting to that vision.
• I finally have face-to-face connections with support staff at Silverpop, from my account rep, to our product transition specialist and even to the internal marketing team. Every single person is willing and enthusiastic about helping customers adopt and take advantage of the Silverpop platform.
• Birds of a feather. Holy cow there are plenty of marketing people out there with similar responsibilities and the varied skillsets needed to operate Marketing Automation and Lead Management. The emerging title is Marketing Operations. I didn’t know this discipline existed, especially living in such a small and lean marketing department as I currently do.

That’s it for now. I reserve the right to add to this post. It’s what I could come up with as I sit in the airport to return home after my first visit to Atlanta. My mind is mush and my motivation is high. Thanks for a great conference!

For the past year and a half, Hudson has participated in the Inavero, Best of Staffing™ awards sponsored by CareerBuilder. It is based on sending surveys to all of our clients that essentially asks a simple question – How likely are you to recommend us to a friend? The answer to that question, rated on a 1-10 scale speak volumes to how well we’re doing as an organization. If a client rates on a scale of 1-6, they are detractors, 7-8 are passives, and 9-10 are promoters meaning they would likely give us word of mouth recommendations. Inavero also collects the primary reason for the rating and anything we could do better with our service.

From a marketing perspective, the survey is golden because it gives us great client testimonials to put in our marketing materials. It helps us with our search engine optimization for people who might be looking for the best IT staffing agencies, or one of the best staffing firms for client satisfaction  (: shaaaaameless linkbuilding right there baby . It also gives us something to validate our quality to prospective clients and candidates. Here you can see one of the ways we address the survey in a web video from our CEO (a quick little production I did with a Flip cam):

From an organizational perspective the survey has even more benefit. It opens a communication channel with clients and helps to rescue relationships that may have ebbed in recent times. For a group spread far and wide like ours, a positive satisfaction rating gives employees a sense of pride. The direct feedback can also inject innovation into the service offering based on great ideas from clients. Overall, I’m convinced that periodic client surveys are a great way to build the quality of a staffing firm. After all, success is built one promoter at a time.

Net Promoter, NPS, and Net Promoter Score are trademarks of Satmetrix Systems, Inc., Bain & Company, and Fred Reichheld.

Planning the Tile Backsplash Project
First thing is first – we needed a plan. We knew that there was a pretty small area in our kitchen to actually install a backsplash. With only a 9′ x 15″ area behind the main cupboards and a small countertop beside our refrigerator there was not a large area in which to get creative. We also have some awkward places where the countertops end so we didn’t know exactly how or where to end the backsplash. We took a trip to our local Lowes to get some ideas.

We probably spent an hour looking and dreaming about a bunch of different ideas, from subway patterned travertine to an all glass tile arrangement. There are a million different choices, and no one but yourself can decide. We bought a few of our favorite ideas, then headed to the local tile store for one more look. The tile store offers even more selection, but everything is special ordered. That was NOT going to help us get the project done in a weekend, so we moved on. At home we hung up our purchases in the kitchen to make our decision.

We really wanted to have glass tiles become a part of our design. The more we looked at the Mosaic Java Glass pattern, the more we liked it. The pattern has a variety of glass, stone and granite tiles in colors that really seemed to pick up our countertop colors and played off of our stainless steel appliances nicely. It was very easy to estimate the number of 12×12 panels needed, and we picked up a few extras to be sure we would have enough.

Mosaics 5/8″ x 5/8″ Java Glass/Stone in 12′ x 12″ squares

The biggest consideration when planning tile is the cutting. With our choice, it seemed that we would be able to avoid cutting altogether. Because the tiles were so small and came attached to a mesh backer, I reasoned that I could cut holes in the mesh for outlets and light switches. I was right. I didn’t do a single tile cut for this entire project which saved a TON of time and money renting a tile saw.

Installing the Tile
Before installation I removed all of the electrical plate covers and taped the electrical contacts so that we could keep the electric on while we were doing the project. It is probably better to turn off the electrical circuit altogether. I guess it is a matter of how safe you want to be.

Attaching the mosaic tile to painted drywall is pretty easy, just make sure to rough up the paint a little bit. I bought the mastic recommended by the Lowes guy. I also had to buy a trowel with the right depth teeth for the small tiles I was installing. After protecting my countertops with cardboard, I put enough mastic on the wall to do one tile panel at a time. I worked from the bottom up, leaving just a small gap between the tile and the countertop. I cut strips of tile from the mat using a utility knife when I needed to fill smaller areas. I used a grout float to push the tiles deeply into the mastic. Once the tiles were set, they didn’t move around much. I probably had 3-4  minutes of working time where I could adjust things if I didn’t like the positioning. I did not use spacers between the mesh sheets. The spacing seemed to work out fine with some plumb and level lines drawn onto the walls to make sure I wasn’t sloping up or downhill. In total, installing the tile probably took about 4 hours.

TEC Invision 1Gallon Tile Adhesive

Precision Components 9″Flooring Trowel w/ 3/16″ Teeth

Tile Edging
One of the biggest causes of concern for me was where to end the tile and how to give it a clean edge. The Lowes guy said that the rule of thumb is to align the edge of the tile to the upper cabinet. When I asked him how I could make a clean edge on the tile, he really didn’t have any ideas for me. So I walked around until I found edging that is meant to separate a tile floor from carpet. This material comes in brass or silver. Perfect! The silver would look great with our nickel cabinet knobs, and stainless appliances.

I ended up making frame edges by cutting the material at 45 degree angles with a hack saw. When doing the mastic, you embed the framing first, then put the tile sheet onto the frame with more mastic. The resulting edge was exactly what I wanted; a non-obtrusive simple silver frame that concealed the edge of the tile.

3/8″ Silver Carpet Edge Trim

Grouting the Mosaic Tile
The next day we embarked on the next task of any tile project – grouting. For this we used an unsanded grout because the tiles are small. I mixed the grout with water and Grout Boost which is supposed to prevent you from having to seal the grout at a later time. I used a grout float to push the grout into the spaces between the tiles. Very quickly I realized that I would have to wipe the grout off of the tiles within 15 minutes of grouting. To be able to grout and wipe effectively, I DEFINITELY needed my trusty assistant there to clean the tiles. The grout tends to want to get into the nooks and crannies of the stone tiles especially, so we used haze remover to ensure we got the tiles as clean as possible.

LATICRETE 8 Lb. Unsanded Grout - Marble Beige

Grout Boost 2.03 lbs. Liquid Grout

Tile Guard 1 Qt. Grout Haze Remover

Finishing the Project
After we allowed the grout to dry, it was onto sealing the stone. Since much of the mosaic is stone tiles, it seemed important to seal them with an oil repellent sealant so that cooking oils won’t stain the backsplash. This was a simple one-time application with a terry cloth sponge. After the sealer dried, I caulked the gap between the tile and the countertop with a clear silicone caulk.

Tile Guard 32 oz. Natural Stone Premium Sealer

Homax Sealer Applicator

GE 9.8 Oz. Clear Silicone Caulk

Completing the Electrical Work
I was surprised to find that one of the most time-consuming aspects of the project was re-installing all of the electrical outlets and switches. Because ceramic tile makes the wall thicker, electrical outlets need to be shimmed out further than they were originally intended to be. Fortunately Lowes sells spacer shims for this exact purpose. The only tricky part of using the shims is the fact that you will likely need longer screws for your outlets to screw into the boxes. The normal length screws were not catching the threads deep enough to screw in, leading me to believe that the boxes were stripped. We bought 1 1/2″ 6-32 machine screws for the extra length needed, and they worked like a charm. We also chose to replace our standard white outlet covers with stainless steel covers to better blend in with our stainless steel appliances.

After all the work installing the backsplash we wanted to enhance its beauty with some under-cabinet lighting. For this we chose plug in puck lights with a dimmer switch. The install was very simple. I drilled holes into the bottom of the cabinets and routed the wiring through the inside of the cabinets and out the top where an electrical outlet already existed to light our lunchbox display above.

IDEAL 25-Pack Spacer/Shims for Wiring Devices

Brainerd Satin Nickel Standard Single Receptacle Wall Plate

Utilitech 6-Light 120V 20-Watt Puck with Dimmer

A Rewarding Home Improvement Project
This was a really satisfying home improvement project that had a dramatic effect on the looks of our kitchen. From the time the idea first struck us on Friday afternoon, we had a functioning backsplash by the end of the day on a Sunday afternoon. By using only materials and expertise from the local home improvement store we saved countless days and hours that we would have spent with a custom tile shop or a contractor. The total cost of the project was about $415.