Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

| By | | 73 Comments

3 Tricks For Keeping Your DIY Momentum Up

Q: Dear John (no it’s not a Dear John letter) and Sherry. I’m begging you (on bare knees in front of laptop now) to write a post that teaches the following: HOW… HOW, I beg you, do you find the motivation and… ENERGY to take on such things after work?! Or even a whole weekend cooped up in a bathroom? I BEG you, please, how do you get that mind-set to get things done?! And after work! It’s incomprehensible to me but I would love to be that person. If you bottle it, I’m buying ten. I know this isn’t a motivational/self-improvement blog but I think your attitude to get things done so consistently does

[ Read More ]

| By | | 73 Comments

Painting Subtle Wall Stripes and Stenciling A Bathroom Floor

When our bloggy friend Roeshel sent over her bathroom makeover it was love at first sight. Here’s her letter: I’d love to submit my bathroom makeover for a reader redesign. Thank you so much for the inspiration! The entire project cost just $512 and I really love the outcome. The ceiling paint, primer and trim and door paint were free (we already had it from previous projects) and the wall paint is Benjamin Moore’s Light Pewter and Nimbus (color matched to Valspar’s Signature paint). The lighting was from Lighting Direct and the oval vanity mirror came from Lowe’s. I painted the floor myself with Valspar Porch and Floor Paint in “Journey” and some Benjamin Moore

[ Read More ]

| By | | 173 Comments

Painting A Round Mirror For Over The Crib

We’re back to share how we painted our $39 Marshall’s mirror so it’s a bit less upscale-formal (in black) and a smidge more playful and nursery-ready (thanks to a few coats of deep asparagus green paint). It was a super straightforward process, although I’m not gonna lie- all those curvy openings definitely took me a bit longer to work around than a basic mirror frame would have. But it was totally worth it in the end. As in, I’d do it again ten times without a second thought. We just love it! We were inspired by the deeper green tones in the leaves from our curtain fabric so the color that we decided on for

[ Read More ]

| By | | 211 Comments

Finding A Good Chair For The Nursery (& How To Test For Lead!)

The exact weekend after we wrapped up our big bathroom makeover, we hightailed it out of town. It wasn’t that we were over staring at our new bathroom (we actually found ourselves going into the room just to ogle our newly spruced surroundings) but it was more like we needed a self-imposed “vacation” after such hard work. Especially my main tile man John. He really deserved a nice little weekend getaway. So we drove five hours up to the family beach house in scenic Rehoboth, Delaware (we know it’s weird to go to the beach in the dead of winter, but we love how quiet and sleepy the off-season is… and we always seize the

[ Read More ]

| By | | 90 Comments

Eight Photography Tips For Rooms & Homes

Q: Do you guys have any tips for photographing your rooms? I’m actually listing my house for sale and thinking of snapping some photos (for memories and also to help with the flier) but I want them to look great. Any and all tricks, tips and suggestions are appreciated! – Leslie A: We totally feel your pain. When we started our blog and were suddenly tasked with sharing photos we had no idea how to make rooms look their best (hence all the fugly pictures way back in our archives). But we did learn our fair share of simple tricks (mostly through trial and error) along the way- and we’re happy to share the goods.

[ Read More ]

| By | | 41 Comments

How To Make A Paneled Chalkboard Door

When one of our favorite super busy DIY moms (she gives me hope!) sent over some photos of her kitchen’s recent door makeover we couldn’t wait to share the goods. Here’s her letter: Hi, guys! Sam and I just finished up our kitchen door project and I was wondering if you thought it might make a fun Reader Redesign. We only spent $35 on it, so I thought it was right up the YHL alley. Everyone can check out the step by step process here and here on my blog. Basically we just applied black chalkboard paint to our flat metal kitchen door and trimmed it out with some lightweight boards (which we had to screw into the

[ Read More ]

| By | | 439 Comments

How To Make No-Sew Curtains

We’re back with our homemade nursery curtain panel how-to. Remember when we revealed our punchy patterned find during last week’s shopping post? Well here’s how we took it from one big bolt of rolled up fabric by P Kaufmann… … to three gorgeous floor-length curtains (two for the window and one for the doorless closet). And probably best of all: there’s no sewing machine required. In fact, here’s my short and sweet list of supplies: tape measure, scissors, iron on hem tape, and an iron of course. Plus we even added a few kid-safe features so stay tuned for those details… But before we get into all the dirty curtain-makin’ details, we should mention that

[ Read More ]

| By | | 95 Comments

A Kitchen Makeover With Maple Cabinets and Quartz Countertops

When Jennifer sent us her almost unrecognizable kitchen before and after pictures we had to share the goods. Here’s her letter: I‘m so excited about my kitchen transformation that I had to send it your way since so much of it was inspired by YHL! Two of my favorite features in my new space (under cabinet spice shelf and sliding barn door) were inspired by this transformation that you guys featured on your blog a few months back. You can see my entire transformation with before/after pics here and the day by day process here. I’m so glad we were able to take the room from a neon green mess (yes, I painted it that

[ Read More ]

| By | | 359 Comments

Eco Friendly Crib Options

Ok, here it is. The much anticipated crib post. First we have to talk about how giddy we are to have a mini-me mattress going on. Let me explain. Remember back when John and I talked about saving our pennies for an organic mattress (after sleeping on a sketchy old hand me down for far to long) back in June of last year? Yeah, we actually had a “mattress fund” going until we could take that baby home. And pretty much ever since the day that we sprung for our own Organic Serenity Natural Dunlop Latex Mattress By Savvy Rest we dreamed of someday getting a mini version for our offspring in the form of

[ Read More ]