Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

Archives for December 2009

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True Dat, True Value

The end of 2009 marks the end of our stint on the True Value DIY Blog Squad (which we excitedly introduced just three short months ago). Cue the nostalgic music: “it’s so haaaaard, to say goodbyyyyyye, to yesterdaaaaaaaaaaay.” But don’t get all teary-eyed on us. We have tons to be grateful for thanks to our amazing three month gig. After all, True Value is the reason we took major leaps forward in getting ready for new additions in 2010 (i.e. the bean + all of the bean’s stuff). They provided gallon upon gallon of Drylok to make our basement storage-ready and supplied the rented demolition hammer that helped get the bathroom project rolling (so we can

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Two Christmas Surprises

Nope, we didn’t find out that we’re having twins. There’s definitely just one little guy or girl in there (we actually found out the bean’s sex the day before Christmas Eve and will be revealing it shortly so stay tuned for that…). But we also discovered two unexpected and totally amazing holiday gifts waiting for us in our PO Box when we checked it one last time before heading over to John’s family’s house on the 24th. One item was a box from one of our lovely readers who attached a note that said she enjoyed our blog regularly and referenced my love of ceramic animals. Of course I could hardly contain myself as I

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How To Turn A Door Into A Message Board With Chalkboard Paint

When Lyzz sent along her awesome DIY chalkboard door project we couldn’t wait to share the goods. Here’s her letter: I found your blog about 6 months ago and have been addicted ever since. I read it every single day and always find so much inspiration. I wanted to share a quick before & after that we took on. We’ve seen many homes painted with chalkboard paint and loved the look but unfortunately most of the homes in California have textured walls, so it was never going to work. Instead, I took the door connecting the house to the garage and used it as a large canvas for chalkboard opportunities. We added a chalkboard calendar

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Overheard.

One of the (many) benefits to being with child is that I’ve been exiled from the bathroom for some of the rougher renovation undertakings. Although it’s sort of sad too, because I love to swing the ol’ sledgehammer from time to time. But the boys (John and his handy tile-slingin’ dad)… … mysteriously sealed themselves into the room with a big plastic tarp just to foil my view (ok, really to keep the house free of flying debris and dust, but still). The good news is that I could still manage to hear pretty well through their plastic bubble of sorts, so every once in a while I’d catch a fraction of their mano a

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Baby Announcement Christmas Card Idea

By now you’re all probably off with your family eating gingerbread and tearing into some presents but we just wanted to share the holiday card we whipped up for our loved ones (since you’re all on our virtual mailing list). We wish you guys a very happy and sweet holiday with the ones you love. And speaking of love, we adore every last one of you for dropping in to see what we’re up to over here at Casa Petersik. Your support and encouragement never fail to put smiles on our faces each and every day, and we’re full of gratitude for the amazing year we’ve been fortunate enough to share with all of you.

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Holiday Roundup: 18 Christmas Decorating Ideas & Projects

With Christmas right around the corner we thought we’d toss together a fun little roundup of a bunch of holiday projects (both old and new) that we’ve whipped up over our last three Christmases as bloggers. Let the festivus begin! Our first stop is a fun table decorating post from last year. Here are just a few of our favorite seasonal set-ups (see more arrangements and additional details here): Here’s how we decorated our tree the last two years, full of tone on tone texture and gleaming metallics (see more pics and get more details here): And here’s a little treat Martha Stewart my sweet hubby tossed together for us while we decorated back in

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A White On White Room Color Palette For A Cottage Vibe

When Sarah sent over her dramatic sitting room makeover we couldn’t wait to share it. Here’s her letter: I gotta tell you I was in a makeover blip with our old cottage here Down Under but you’ve given me back my zing! Here’s our transformation of the worst sitting room eva! We snapped the before photos of this delightful room at the open house when we bought our beach cottage a year ago, complete with wall art and two tv’s. Now it’s a lot more cozy and current. To see more you can check out my blog. Keep up the good work. Here’s to DIY!  -Sarah in Australia Here’s the crazy and cluttered before: And

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Our Affordable Basement Makeover

We’re back with the full rundown of basement projects that we took on to totally transform our spooky bug graveyard into clean and functional storage space. First let’s take a walk down memory lane to reminisce about the creepy jail-cell-looking room that we started with: Gross eh? The worst was that although the exterior of the basement’s foundation was equipped with drains and graded to reduce water flow, we still had a bit of moisture seepage through those porous unsealed cinder block walls every time we got a good amount of rain. It wasn’t as if the room flooded by any means, but it was damp and nasty because water slowly oozed through the walls

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How To Hang Cement Board & Fix The Subfloor

As if our bathroom didn’t already make it abundantly clear during the demo process, the act of putting things back together certainly proved that renovating an old bathroom is a lot of work. And it’s almost always full of surprises. Nothing we couldn’t handle though. Let’s just say we were kept on our toes. As you may recall from this post, my dad just DIYed two separate bathroom remodels this year in his own home and kindly volunteered his time, expertise and tools to help us with ours (hooray free labor – although there was some obligatory feeding involved). So I took two days off of work to give the three of us a four-day-long-mega-weekend

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Advice For First-Time DIYers

Q: I have a HUGE question for you! My husband and I have now lived in our first house for close to a year. We share your motivation, but are very intimidated by the projects that we’d like to tackle. Neither one of us is super handy, and I guess we’re afraid of “breaking” our little nest. What did you two do to get past the hump of “how on earth do we do this and not cause an even bigger problem in the end?” Thanks! -Amy A: This is a great question! Especially because when we moved into our house just three short years ago we knew nothing. We were beyond beginners. We literally

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