Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

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How To Hang Pictures Over The Bed

Do you remember these puppies that we picked up at a yard sale last year for $10 a pop? They’re old professionally framed prints of the berries and wildflowers of Alaska, which we thought were sweet since we honeymooned there. So we spray-painted the frames (and mats!) and hung them on either side of our bed. If that doesn’t jog your memory, perhaps this old pic from that post shall will. Well, recently they’ve – say it with me now – come together. Here’s how it all went down. Actually, speaking of going down – it kinda started when a certain ram went down during our book shoots. Since neither all the king’s horses nor

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An Eclectic Glam Tween Bedroom

Clara may be another year older, but she’s still a long ways off from her tweenage years. Which is why it was fun to live vicariously through Courtney’s makeover of her 11-year-old niece Emily’s room. Having virtually crashed Courtney’s own home last May, we knew there’d be some great eye candy, and we often hear from folks who’d love to see a tween room or two, so here ya go. Hi guys! I hope all is well in the Petersik house. I wanted to show you my 11 year old niece’s room that we helped her makeover. She would be so excited for her room to be featured! This was an accumulation of four very

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Decorating A Dollhouse

Hold onto your miniature hats, it’s time for the fun part of painting and personalizing the dollhouse! Our last post was full of the building process, which you can see by (clicking here) – so let’s move on to how we finished everything off. After it was all assembled, it was time to schlep our 31″ x 31″ creation up into the sunroom for some priming and painting. Just like our office cabinets, kitchen cabinets, and the play kitchen we made for Clara, I used a coat of Zinsser Smart Prime (it’s no-VOC but amazingly good for blocking bleed through when you’re painting raw or stained wood) followed by two coats of Bejamin Moore’s low-VOC Advance paint (really

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How To Build A Dollhouse

Update: You can check out Part 2 of this project right here. But let’s start at the beginning. When Sherry and I started talking about building a dollhouse for Clara, I was afraid. I know, I know – scared of a dollhouse? Get your laughs out. But that ominous word conjured up these elaborate images of perfectly crafted, to-scale replicas of Victorian mansions that seemed waaaaay beyond my skill / patience level. But once Sherry showed me some of her inspiration pictures on Pinterest (from Mousehouse, Natty Michelle and Under The Sycamore) my cold sweats dried up and I actually got a little excited. Yes, excited about a dollhouse. Now get those laughs out. More

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How To Cut Your Man’s Hair

Let’s talk about DIY haircuts, shall we? This is one of those posts I never thought I’d write (it’s definitely not very home related) but due to a surprising amount of requests, here it is. I guess anything that has to do with saving money and doing something yourself is fair game, right? I have no idea how I got into cutting people’s hair, but throughout high school and college I just played around, cutting off a guy’s mullet here and giving my BFF a super short pixie cut there (all at my “client’s” requests, of course). Why did they trust me? I have no idea. Maybe I just have a trustworthy face? I most

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Replacing An Old Bathroom Light

We don’t talk much about our hall bathroom. In fact, in 17 months of living here, it’s been the subject of just two posts (knocking down a towel bar and fixing the toilet). And since we later used almost the same color as the inspiration room in our guest bedroom, we’re no longer planning to use that color in here, so we’re kind of back to square one. But we finally made a little lighting progress, as today’s title suggests. There was nothing especially offensive about the existing fixture – nor anything especially exciting about it. It felt sort of builder basic to us. And kind of “backstage make-up room” to us thanks to the

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A Worm Themed Birthday Party

Aw, yeah. Clara’s second b-day party was full of food, family, friends, fun… and worms (she picked the theme based on her deep love of looking at, drawing, and even dreaming about worms). So… worm to your motha! We were so thankful to be surrounded by the people we love, the bean had the best time, and the 75 degree weather and sunny skies were the icing on the worm cake. Or should I say worm cupcakes. Let’s get this party (breakdown) started… But let’s start at the beginning. Clara was born two years ago today. Wait, that’s too far back. Let’s just cover the party. Here’s the sunroom all decked out for the big

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DIYing vs. Living In Your Home & Enjoying It

Q: Since you decorate/upgrade/reno your house for a living, do you ever feel like you are always working on your house but not ever getting to just live in it and enjoy it? Like when you spend all day cooking in the kitchen by dinnertime you aren’t hungry and don’t even want to eat half the time. If something (like your house) is never quite done and there’s a to do list longer than the purchase contract, is it hard to just peacefully sit without always thinking about the next project and thereby giving yourself low level anxiety? Or….am I the anxious one which is why this even occurred to me? – Rach A: Haha,

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Adding Pelmet Board Window Treatments

Vanessa sent us her kitchen makeover that clocked in at just over a hundred beans and it made us more than a little giddy. But we’ll let her take you through the story of how she got so much bang her buck. Here’s her letter: In 11 years of marriage, my husband and I have lived in seven cities and sometimes have moved multiple times in each city. Needless to say, I have become a pro at making each house a home. One thing I have always wanted to do, but have been too chicken to tackle it – is paint my kitchen cabinets. Now, in our seventh home, I finally decided to do it.

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A Flush Mounted Light Near The Fireplace

Even though we declared our kitchen project done over a month ago, there are still little dangling tasks hanging over our heads. Some, quite literally. See that shadeless stick of a pendant hanging down from the ceiling in the fireplace area? That old pendant has been broken forever (despite me fixing it once already) so that half of the room has been cloaked in darkness for months. Well, or least in comparison to the rest of the room which has been light and bright since our little lighting overhaul during the kitchen reno. Our temporary lighting solution has been this floor lamp tucked in the corner. But it too has woes of its own. One

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Planning A Worm Themed Birthday Party

As we mentioned for a hot minute back in this post, Clara picked her party theme this year. What does she love more than monkeys, ice cream, firetrucks, and the mailman? Worms. So the first thing on the party agenda was settling on a date (this Saturday the 12th, two days before her actual b-day on the 14th) and figuring out the guest list (our closest family and friends totaling about 30 people, ten who are kiddos under the age of four). Then it was the fun part. Invitations! We made three versions of them before picking our favorite (yes, making invitations is our idea of a good time). For the first one we used

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April Superlatives

For those asking where the April Superlatives went, here they are! Remember how last week was all about organizing? Well, we weren’t organized enough to share this post on time. Oops. So before May gets too far gone, here’s a look back at all the things we got checked off the ol’ to-do list in April (in yearbook style superlatives, of course). We even tossed in some never-before-seen stuff for kicks. You can check out all of our monthly superlatives dating back to January of 2011 right here (it’s over a years worth of projects crammed into just 15 posts). Oh, and we’re starting this round up with my latest obsession. You have been warned. Most

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