Walls and Ceilings - Need Help with porcelian ceramic tile removal

We decided to make a backsplash around our kitchen counters. I told my fiance to leave the faceplates on the outlets and lightswitches so we wouldn't mess up--i guess i should've told him to draw lines around the faceplates. Which I didn't think of and he didn't do. (Can you tell where this is heading and that this was our first time tiling ANYTHING :wall: ) Well now we can't get the tile off from around the outlets and lightswitches to correct the problem. He's already chipped one tile pretty badly trying to get it off. Any suggestions would be great. Only drywall is behind the tiles. so i'm going to assume we're gonna damage our walls pretty good when we get done.

~~Michelle~~

what did you use to put up the tiles - mastic or thinset? Mastic will soften with water so if you can dribble some water behind the tile you might just get it off fairly easily, especially if it was recently put up. If it's thinset you're going to just have to try to minimze the damage. Even if you get the tiles of without cracking or chipping you've got dried thinset on the backs. The best course in this case is often to break the tiles you want to remove with a hammer or chisel to the center than work with the pieces. You'll still tear off some drywall paper but hopefully not too much.

good luck!

Thanks for responding. We used mastic, but its been up for a couple months so not very recent. We'll try both methods. I'll post the outcome or any other questions i might have.

Thanks!!

Michelle