Learn Italian: Metto il tappeto su questo pavimento tra il tavolo e il divano. - I put the carpet on this floor between the table and the sofa.

We combine su (on) with definite articles like il to make sul, but here the word following the preposition is questo (this). Prepositions stay separate and do not combine before words like questo or quello.

Could I use fra instead of tra in this sentence?

Yes, absolutely! tra and fra both mean between and are completely interchangeable. Italians often choose whichever one sounds better with the surrounding words to avoid repeating sounds, but grammatically they both work perfectly here.

Is the grammar for saying something is between two objects the same in Italian as in English?

Yes! Just like in English, you use tra (between) followed by the first object, the word e (and), and then the second object, which gives us tra il tavolo e il divano.

Why doesn't the sentence start with io if it translates to I put?

In Italian, the ending of the verb tells you who is doing the action. The -o at the end of metto already means I put, so the subject pronoun io is naturally dropped unless you want to emphasize who is doing the action.