Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

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#165: The Dumb Thing We Did Before Listing Our House

We’re fessing up to an extremely poorly timed project that made our house look WORSE right before it hit the market. Whoops. Plus we share the smorgasbord of ways we’re selling our houses. All three are being sold differently (including some with and some without the help of a real estate agent). So we’re breaking down how and why we chose each route, including why we paid to have a “pre-inspection” done for our Richmond home and how that changed our preparations for listing the house. Plus Sherry talks about an unconventional (and completely accidental) way she decluttered her digital life. What’s New This is literally the cleanest, emptiest, cobwebless-est our garage has been since

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Quick Demo-Free Bathroom Makeover

This bathroom came together so quickly, we almost can’t believe it ourselves (and we witnessed it with our own four eyeballs). If we hadn’t watched it fly along ourselves, while everything just seemed to line up perfectly, we probably wouldn’t have thought it was possible – especially after the longest-bathroom-reno-of-our-lives that we started way back in October. (Yes it’s still going, but next week we’ll have a full reveal & budget breakdown! FINALLY!). Meanwhile, in less than a week, this upstairs hall bathroom went from looking the way that it has looked for years (old painted double vanity, two yellow-beige sea-shell shaped sinks, bare white walls, old seams in need of some fresh caulk around

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#164: How We’re Getting Our House Ready To Sell

With our big move only a few months away, what do we need to do to get our house ready to sell? This week we’re outlining some of the projects we’re taking on – both big and small – including the fast-tracked makeover of our hall bathroom. John also outlines a shopping challenge of his very own for 2020 that’ll push us to look more locally when we seek certain items. Plus, can a simple pen and paper save you money? We’re looking into an ancient budgeting method that promises to do so. Oh, and there’s an unintended rant about The Bachelor. What’s new If you missed our big news about moving last week, you

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Why We’re Downsizing To A Smaller House In A Warmer State

In case you haven’t had a chance to listen to this week’s podcast or read the transcript, we wanted to put our big news into an actual blog post. This is one of the biggest life changes we’ve made in the last decade, so we want to get everyone up to speed. And a huge thank you for all the support and encouragement you’ve shared for this new adventure of ours. We can’t wait to live with less, be outside a lot more, and eat even more fresh-caught shrimp than we ever thought possible. And yes, to everyone asking – we definitely plan to share more about downsizing, moving, renovating, and even things like feeling

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#163: Our Next Big Project (It’s REALLY BIG)

Wanna know what our next big renovation project is? Well, it’s actually something that we’ve been contemplating for years but finally have the courage to do (thanks in part to selling our duplex). So this week we’re breaking down why we want to do it, why we think now is the time, and why it has us feeling excited, sad, and inspired all at the same time. Plus it’s really going to put our fondness for simplifying to the ultimate test. And some recent travel hiccups led us to a few new books that we’re loving – and one that I’m looking forward to loving… as weird as that sounds. What’s New If you can’t

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How To Drill Through Tile

One challenge when building the floating shelves in our duplex kitchens was drilling through the tile backsplash. After all, we had just spent a lot of time and money installing all of this beautiful tile. We didn’t want to mess it up! Was it a little scary? Yes. But is it totally doable? Also yes. Let’s talk about it. Ideally, we would’ve hung our shelf supports before tiling. Buuuuuut we weren’t seeing eye-to-eye about where to (or even *if* to) hang shelves. Luckily we resolved our stalemate shortly after tiling (I won’t bother you with who was right… but let’s just that person is very handsome and very humble). We decided to install a chunkier

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#162: What Sherry’s Not Buying For An Entire Year

That’s right, there’s a new personal shopping challenge going on at our house – and this time Sherry has committed to skipping any purchases in a specific (and pretty wide category) FOR AN ENTIRE YEAR. We’re also talking with simplicity expert Emily Ley about how she combats “busyness” and creates more time and space in her life. She’s giving us tips on everything from tackling your family calendar to fun ways to get the kids involved in streamlining your days. And we’re sharing our favorite way to hang heavy objects quickly, without a lot of dust or tools – along with our new favorite guilty pleasure show that makes us laugh out loud (and even

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How We Organized The Beach House Kitchen

Someone asked me the other day for details on how we organized the beach house kitchen, which is something we photographed and filmed this summer to share with you guys, and when I went to send them the link to this post, I realized that we never actually wrote it! So yes, these pictures sat on the camera for months as my tan faded, along with memories of warm days spent with my toes in the sand (current status: toes in my Ugg slippers because it’s freezing!). Years ago you guys liked having a look inside of our Richmond kitchen cabinets, so John and I had some fun snapping lots of organizing photos for this

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#161: Then Half Of Our Lights Went Out…

This week we’re sharing the mystery of how half of the power in our house suddenly went out when we were just about to leave the country on vacation. We’re also catching you up on the highs and lows of getting our bathroom nearly completed, including how the flu, a surgery, and a sudden deadline kept us on our toes. Plus, an illuminating update to our upstairs hallway and what we learned about “life admin” and how to better tackle it. What’s New First off, if you missed last week’s episode and our big duplex news, you can listen to it here or read a full transcript here. Sherry also referenced a previous episode about

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How To Make Built-In Pantry Shelves

I’m so excited to share how we constructed these built-in pantry shelving for our beach house. They’re surprisingly straightforward to construct and can be easily customized to any space, even if you’ve got a small pantry or simple pantry closet. They’re made entirely of two things: 3/4″ MDF sheets and 1 x 2″ pine boards (well, and some screws and nails). Plus, this process can be easily adapted to just about any space where you want to add some custom storage or shelving (bedrooms, playrooms, living rooms, etc). So even if you’re a beginner, you can do this. Seriously. Also, if you’re looking for more shelf ideas & DIY shelving projects, this post has 16

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How To Add Decorative Wall Molding

We love a DIY wall molding just as much as the next blogger, but I think we have a new favorite: the thick framing that we added to our bathroom. And it almost didn’t happen! And it was one of the smaller costing line items compared to a lot of other updates we did in there (gotta love when that happens!). We still have some finishing touches to put on the room before we’re ready to “reveal” it fully (like a bathroom door would be nice – and we’re also going to share a full budget breakdown in that big “after” post) but I know that many of you are eager to hear about this

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#160: And Now For Some Big Duplex News

It’s our first episode of 2020 and WE BOY DO WE HAVE NEWS! We’re excited to share it because it not only means good things for us, our friends, and the duplex itself, but it’s also connected to our continued efforts to simplify, and it involves a twisty tale of switching tables with a stranger. We’re also sharing a special gift that we gave this holiday season that can help your family honor a loved one. Plus, a check-in on our bathroom reno progress, the Instagram account that keeps us laughing, and our favorite geography-based game we’ve ever played. What’s New Our Big Duplex News Game: Weird Town Names We’re Digging If you’re looking for

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