RENOVATION: Oak Kitchen Countertop and Backsplash

This is a blast from the past post, which basically means: I wrote the post a LONG time ago, and for whatever reason, never pressed "publish" for your reading enjoyment. Anyway, I love our wood countertops, and felt like even though the project was completed long ago, the context was still on point for sharing. Enjoy!

For the last year (2016), we have continued to tackle 50 step, complex projects within Content. Somewhere in the spring though, rooms were more or less livable, and those lofty projects gave way to simply trying to finish at least 1 room in the house, 100%.

Funny as that sounds, I cannot with all certainty, claim that even one room in Content is completely done. I think this is the blessing and curse of a DIYer. You get to control the speed of your projects, but you also can procrastinate the hell out of them too.

Just the other day, John presented me with one of these to-do lists for the master bathroom and bedroom. Entitled "FINAL TO-DO" it had all the makings of closure, but what I didn't have the heart to remind him of, were the few projects he had overlooked. We'll get there. No sense in beating a dead horse (house), whatever. Same difference here.

Most recently, John set his focus on finishing the kitchen counter top and back splash. If you recall, John made the kitchen island and counter tops out of large oak slabs. This post should be a good refresher. 

For sometime we debated the back splash. Should we extend brick along the whole inner wall? Should we incorporate tile? Do we really need a back splash at all?

Debate after debate, we always came back to: Yes, we need a back splash and yes, it will likely be wood. No surprise there.

First,