kitchen flooring help/advice needed

we are doing work on our house. its a split, with the kitchen and dining room side-by-side at the back of the house. well, we added an extension, and that rectangle of space will be used maybe 75% family room area and 25% eating section.

i'm torn as to whether or not i should have the eating area tiled or just to put hardwood flooring throughout. In trying to keep the areas separate, and considering possible furniture layouts, it's been driving me nuts. and no, i dont think i'd want tile in the family room area

if you have hardwood flooring in your eating area (keep in mind i have a 1 year old, and plan on having more kids), is it a nightmare to keep clean? does it get scratched easily? there is also a door to the backyard in our eating area, so it will be a heavy traffic area

Re: kitchen flooring help/advice needed

We have hardwood in our kitchen which has large eat in area. The door to the backyard is there as well. While it would not be my choice to have hardwood in the kitchen it's not a nightmare at all. A good swiffer to it and it's as clean as tile would be.