Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

| By | |

The Best Home Air Purifier

You know I love writing a spare-no-details product review (like this one and this one), so when enough people pointed out that when they search the blog for info about our beloved air purifier, nothing really comes up, I thought… I shall remedy that today. I know. I’m a hero. I feel like I should also point out that we bought these ourselves with our own money and nobody at their company knows us from Adam. Sherry has always suffered from bad seasonal allergies, so we were thrilled to find a home air purifier that finally gave her the allergy relief that so many companies promise. The allergy difference that it makes for Sherry is

[ Read More ]

| By | |

How To Paint Ikea Kitchen Cabinets

We’ve painted kitchen cabinets before. We’ve done Ikea kitchen cabinets before. But painting Ikea kitchen cabinets was a new combo move for us. And despite a nagging voice in our heads that asked if it was a bad idea (paint laminate? or slick factory finished cabinets?! can that even be durable?! ), we’re extremely happy with the final result. Plus, it was pretty easy to do – no paint sprayer or fancy equipment necessary! We’re about a month into using them every day and so far they’re holding up wonderfully. They’ve been scratched, scrubbed, kicked, and real-life tested by two kids and so far no scrapes, dings, or dents to report. They look as good

[ Read More ]

| By | |

How To Make A DIY Trellis

Behold: our DIY wire trellis! I’ve wanted to try this project for over a decade and I’m over the moon with how it’s turned out. All it took was some basic tools, wire & hooks, plus a climbing vine to bring it to life. Oh, and planning. It does a bit of planning. So let’s show you how to make your own! My urge to make a vine trellis intensified after we painted our house white last fall. The back of our garage practically screamed “ADD A DIAMOND TRELLIS ON ME!” It feels like such a chic garden accent, that our white house finally felt fancy enough for one. Wire Trellis Before & After Before

[ Read More ]

| By | |

A Quick Way To Hang Curtain Rods

We just installed approximately one million curtain rods at our duplex (okay, actually just 16 of them) so we wanted to share a simple trick we used to speed up installation, while still keeping everything looking level and equally spaced. This should take a lot of the headache out of hanging new curtains, especially if you’re doing more than one window in your room. Plus, the trick is totally free! For this installation, we’re using affordable curtain rods like these that you can get at most big box stores and these ring clips. We also are hanging simple $14 white Ikea curtain panels using this trick for making Ikea curtains look expensive. Together, these tips

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Adding Smart Blinds

So last month I wrote a post about the smart tech we added, ditched, and love most in our house. And in it I mentioned that I’d share a detailed smart blind post for you “in a few days” because they’re hands down one of my favorite smart home features that we’ve added. Apparently I overshot that deadline just a smidge, but better late than never. So let’s dive into where we got them, why we chose them, how they’re powered, the upsides & downsides, and – of course – how much they cost (please note that I cannot explain why I insist on calling them “blinds” when they’re technically roller shades). Let’s start with

[ Read More ]

| By | |

How To Build DIY Garage Shelving

We needed some heavy-duty garage shelving for our new shed, so we turned to this easy shelf tutorial from our friend Ana White. They stand up to the weight of heavier items like paint cans or large tools (more than your typical plastic or wire garage shelf) and are also SUPER straightforward to construct. I’ll show how we got there, but here’s where I ended up. We ended up loving this technique so much, we repeated it when we needed heavy-duty shelves in the shed at our beach house too (seen below). They’re such an easy DIY project (even for beginners) and I find them FAR superior to most store-bought garage shelving units. Building long

[ Read More ]

| By | |

The Best Smart Home Tech

It has been almost 4 years since we last detailed the ways we use smart home technology to make our household more efficient. Since then we’ve changed homes, states, and even our smart home systems. So today I thought I’d break down what we’ve added, what we’ve gotten rid of, and what still has a stranglehold on my nerdy tech-loving heart (and even one that was Sherry’s idea!). As usual, none of the products mentioned in this post are sponsored or gifted. It’s just stuff that we have bought and loved – or (in some cases) don’t love so much anymore. So let’s get into it. STILL LOVE: Alexa Voice Assistant Call us basic, but

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Introducing Penny Petersik!

If you follow our Instagram stories, you’ve probably seen the news that we welcomed a new member of the Petersik family recently. But I wanted to take a moment to properly introduce her here on the blog. So… say hello to Penny! After Burger, our chihuahua of 15 years, passed away in October, we were wrecked. It was a huge loss for our family, and in the initial days after Burger’s passing we donated a ton of things he left behind (our vet was able to pass along his treats, food, crate, and heart medication to other dogs in need of those items). Of course we saved a few keepsakes like his collar and blanket,

[ Read More ]

| By | | 270 Comments

How To Add Crown Molding To Cabinets

Updated January 2022 Do your kitchen cabinets feel a little bit unfinished? Or maybe don’t quite reach your ceiling, leaving a weird gap? We’ll gonna show you how we installed crown molding to give our upper cabinets a simple DIY upgrade. It’s one of my favorite, easy kitchen projects – and we completed it in just 3 hours! Why We Added Crown Molding To Our Kitchen Cabinets When we finished our kitchen reno last year we decided to forgo any crown molding on the top of our upper wall cabinets because we decided we liked the clean, modern look of the square edge. Plus we had never installed crown molding before, so I think we

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Adding Storage To A Small Kids Bedroom

When we thought about all the functions that would be helpful to have in our son’s bedroom, which can definitely be described as “cozy” when it comes to the size (real talk: this room is small), he needed: We definitely could have pulled the “your room is really small for a desk, not sure we can do that” card – but we thought it was worth a try thanks to the idea of customizing a built-in desk right next to the bed that could double as a nightstand. And low and behold, it worked like a charm. So yes, this small room has everything on that list we shared. A bookshelf, a desk (that also

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Costa Rica With Kids

We have so many good things to say about our family vacation to Costa Rica! This was our first international trip with our kids and we’re convinced it was the best possible destination for their first passport stamp. It was relaxing, enriching, and fun all of us. So today we’ll answer all of your questions: where we stayed, what we did, and how we navigated a foreign country with young kids. When you have little kids (ours are 5 and 9) it’s tempting to default to the low-stress, easy-to-plan vacation. So part of our goal with this trip was to break out of that rut, and step outside of our travel comfort zone. It was

[ Read More ]

| By | |

#182: A Big Catch Up Holiday-ish Special (Surprise!)

So much has happened since we last picked up the podcast mic, so we have a jam-packed show to catch you up on all the things. We’re talking house updates, embarrassing stories, renovation plans, and we even worked in some bad metaphorical diagrams (because describing graphs and charts you can’t see always goes over well in an audio format). We’re also diving into how house projects have slowed down around here, the remaining projects on our list, and how our attitude towards having less on our to-do list has changed pretty dramatically over the years. Plus an impromptu musical exercise that captured our family’s contentment for living in a smaller home, and why Sherry can

[ Read More ]