Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

Posts By John Petersik

John Petersik is one half of the duo behind the award-winning home improvement and do-it-yourself design blog, Young House Love. Together, he and his wife Sherry have renovated seven homes, published two New York Times Bestselling books, and designed products sold in Target and Home Depot. They are currently enjoying their downsized home on Florida's Gulf Coast with their two kids and their dog, Penny.

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How To Tile And Grout An Outdoor Area

Remember when we tiled the floor out back earlier this month? Oh yeah, we barely do either. It has been such a drawn out process thanks to various battles with cold and rain that I can’t believe it’s taken this long to finally get to this: a (mostly) finished floor! Don’t mind that light looking grout (it’s actually charcoal gray – but we’ll get to that in a minute). We’re really happy with how it turned out – especially compared to the stained cement floor that we started with (you can read more about why we opted to tile rather than just paint or stain the existing cement floor, and how we picked our tile

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Those Times We Made Bad Painting Decisions

Once again it’s one of those weeks where we’ll all over the place. After stenciling the floor in our bath and closet, eking out some seasonal craftiness, and hanging extra thick crown in Clara’s room we’re now in the midst of sealing the stenciled floors, completing the canopy wall in Clara’s room, ripping up the old carpeting on our stairs, and not-so-patiently waiting to grout the sunroom tile floor as soon as things dry up out there (Mother Nature is playing a cruel joke on us with all of this rain). And in the middle of it all, we got this question that I thought would be interesting to think about. So here we go.

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A Big Boy Bedroom With Orange & Navy

This time last year we had just wrapped up our first book tour stop in Cincinnati, where we learned how much fun it was to put faces to some of the names that we knew from comments and the blogosphere at large. And now, we’re actually able to put a room makeover to one of those faces & names, so check out Sarah’s redesign of her son Carson’s room, both of whom we crossed paths with back in Ohio last October. Hi John & Sherry! I don’t know if you remember me, but we met at your first book signing here in Cincinnati, and my boys were the ones who scribbled all over your signing

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How To Install Extra Thick Crown Molding

Sherry is officially half-done with Clara’s canopy wall update, so thanks so much to all 900+ of you who commented with votes and additional suggestions! We shared tons of photoshopped images with Clara and she decided we should combine a few ideas, and well, the kid’s a genius and we can’t wait to share the photos. We might just let her decide what we should do in every room. But I, ever the party pooper, was determined to check a certain project off of my list that was over a month old before Sherry got to work on that wall: adding chunky double-wide crown molding in there. So yes, feel free to boo me because

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Fab Freebie: Productivity With Pop

If the movie “Office Space” is the epitome of working a desk job, then Poppin aims to be the antidote. Their site injects color, life, and cheer into the otherwise ordinary objects of office life: from staplers and push pins to notebooks and file cabinets (even art and furniture too). So if you’ve ever dreamed of decking out your desk, here’s your chance because they’re giving someone a $500 gift card this week. Please use the Rafflecopter widget below to enter (it might take a second to load, but it should eventually pop up below this paragraph). This giveaway is available to residents of the United States (although we do have an international giveaway lined

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A Modern Kitchen With Blonde Wood Cabinets

Karin is a pet photographer from Minneapolis and apparently when she’s not snapping pretty pictures of pooches, she’s busy creating a pretty darned awesome kitchen. We know you guys like to a see non-white kitchens when those come in, and this one is actually an all wood one. Check out her letter below, which I’ve peppered with some of Karin’s awesome before & afters. Well, and one demo-tastic during shot. Hi Sherry and John! You’ve been an inspiration for my husband and I as we purchased our first home last summer and immediately started tearing it apart. After years of renting, we finally took the plunge and purchased our first home. We wanted something open

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Fab Freebie: On Your Mark, Get Set, Sew!

With last week’s fabric-filled giveaway still on our brains, we thought you could use something to turn random swatches of fabric into something awesome this week. Enter the Singer Vivo sewing machine, stage left. It’s conveniently compact, and it’s made with non-sewers in mind – so it’s for any do-it-yourselfers and crafters who are looking to knock out projects (like this embellished dishtowel tutorial) without having to lug out a bulky machine or pore over an instruction manual. And to make your new life as a sewing ninja even easier, they’re also throwing in some scissors and a thread kit for a total prize package of over $300. Please use the Rafflecopter widget below to

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Revere Pewter, The Gray Wall Paint Everyone Loves

We were trapped inside for the last few days due to rain, so we made some progress by tackling the job of painting our recently de-carpeted bathroom & closet. Here’s a shot of what we eventually got the space to look like, complete with stenciled floor, and – what we’re talking about today – Benjamin Moore’s Revere Pewter on the walls. But let’s rewind for a second. First up was painting the cream trim white (we went with Benjamin Moore Simply White in semi-gloss, just like the trim in the rest of the house). Part of me hates to downplay the time that task took by sharing one measly before & after picture to cover

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How To Install Outdoor Fans

Truth: Sherry was oddly into fan hunting and the idea of adding two new fans to keep our freshly-opened sunroom cool (and to create a nice mosquito-warding-off current while we’re out there relaxing), but I was NOT excited about said fans. We actually have quite a bit of practice removing fans (I submit to you Exhibits A, B and C) – and just look at how happy it made me. Generally we’ve had 7.5 to 8′ ceilings in most rooms with them, and being 6′ tall, I’ve always felt like they were low-hanging oversized pinwheels that were one inch shy of giving me a haircut – although we’re suckers for function, so we’ve always kept

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A Nursery With A Planet Wall Mural

Some of our friends with sons lament that it’s hard to find inspiring boy rooms, which is why we’re always excited when a cool one shows up in our inbox. And our excitement for Dacia and Jordan’s nursery creation could almost be described as “out of this world.” Pun intended. Here’s Dacia’s email: Hi John & Sherry! I wanted to share my nursery with you guys. When we found out that our very first wee one was going to be a little dude, I immediately took off with designing the nursery. I had a plan all worked out, and then one night my hubby (who normally couldn’t give two hoots about decorating) sweetly said, “Would

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Fab Freebie: Er, Should We Say “U-Fab Freebie”

For years now, one of our favorite places to score awesome fabric on a budget has been a local shop called U-Fab (also run by a young married duo!). Everything from our headboard to our old dining room curtains to the backdrop we used for last week’s pregnancy announcement has hailed from there. And now that they’ve launched an e-shop, we’re excited to do a giveaway with them. And not just any giveaway – a $500 gift card giveaway! So, you can either stock up on fabrics… or take their custom upholstery services for a spin (they do bedding, pillows, window treatments, and even furniture). Plus, they’re all-around nice, fun-loving people. Please use the Rafflecopter

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Leveling and Dry Fitting Tile In An Outdoor Area

Since we last checked in on the sunroom last Thursday, Sherry and I have managed to check four more things off the list: installing two ceiling fans, cleaning the concrete floor, leveling it, and cutting the tile and planning out our pattern (aka: dry fitting). But excuse me while I backburner the fan installation tutorial (I promise it’ll pop up in a few days) because we’re just too psyched to share those three tiling prep steps with you guys. We made some serious weekend progress – more than we thought we would – and we couldn’t be more excited about the tile pattern that we landed on. In fact, I’m probably outside tiling as you

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