Young House Love

DIY Home Decorating Projects, Tutorials, & Shenanigans

| By | |

Creating A DIY Vine Trellis

Before it gets too cold to do any more outdoor updates around here, we snuck in a fun little project that I’ve been dying to try for, oh 10 years now. Actually the first time I was like “yeah – I want that” was upon seeing one of those cool diamond trellis things waaaay back in 2009 on the outside of this house that we crashed (yes, that’s 10 years ago! Even though I swear 1999 sounds like 10 years ago in my head). I wish we had captured a picture of it for that post, but I think there was blotchy sunlight on it so it didn’t make the final cut. But that family

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Our Bathroom Reno: The Floor Plan & Tile Picks!

Ok, now we’re cooking with gas! Maybe I shouldn’t use that expression for a bathroom reno… ANYWAY… we’ve made lots of progress since partially demo-ing the room last week (more on that here), and wanted to share our final floorpan with you (IT’S SUCH A GIANT IMPROVEMENT!) and our final tile picks (along with a few other things we debated, why we chose what we chose, etc). So here’s the old bathroom layout. Yes we lived with it like this for over six years. Yes, it was A LOT of doors (the one leading from the hall to our bedroom is right behind where the tub is below – so there were five in a

[ Read More ]

| By | |

4 Low-Tech Ways We’re Planning Our Latest Room Makeover

We’re in the midst of two room redos right now and I couldn’t be more excited about them! One is the master bathroom reno that we shared last week, and the other is a much lighter and less dusty one, which involves zero demo or wall moving, but a whole lot of function that we’ll be gaining (plus a wall treatment + wallpaper, which thrills me to no end). We’re “reconfiguring” the middle bedroom at our beach house, which used to look like this. Yes, it’s a very small room that was basically all bed: Having a lighter room redo running in the background while we wait for orders like the master bathroom tub &

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Our Long Awaited Master Bathroom Reno Begins

If you listened to this week’s podcast you heard John and I proclaim that we’ve moved from the verrrrry long daydreaming and changing our minds phase of our master bathroom planning process (which lasted over 6 years while we renovated most of the other rooms in our house as well as the entire beach house & duplex) into the finally-being-sure-of-what-we-want-to-get-out-of-it and beginning to actively space-plan it phase. For example, after years of going back and forth about whether we wanted a separate tub and shower or a tub/shower combo, we’re now 100% sold on separate ones (we have that setup at the beach house and it’s our favorite bathroom ever). I even said on this

[ Read More ]

| By | |

A Big Kitchen Makeover Created From Little Changes

I’ve been so excited to show you Teresa and Andrew’s kitchen makeover. They’re some of our closest friends who live right around the corner from us, and ever since we filmed this bookcase styling time-lapse video in their living room, I’ve been not-so-patiently waiting for their new appliances to arrive so we could share a big ol’ virtual kitchen tour with you guys. Not only do they have amazing style, they also made SO MANY budget-friendly choices in this kitchen and I really hope they help to demonstrate that you can often work with a lot more than you might think (you don’t always have to scrap everything and start over!). And you can save

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Our DIY “Stained Glass” Window (That Hangs On The Wall)

We had a totally different post planned for today, but then a super fun/random project fell into our laps on Monday night. We weren’t sure how things would turn out (we were kinda making up a DIY technique as we went along), but to say that we’re pleasantly surprised is a giant understatement. This might be my favorite under $10 project in the history of my life. And it could easily be repeated with any window you find at a thrift store, architectural salvage shop, or even at your local Habitat for Humanity ReStore. SAVE ALL THE GORGEOUS OLD WINDOWS, GUYS! Or you could just wander the streets hoping to be in the right place

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Our Second Tiny House Makeover (Aka, Dollhouse Number Two)

Since you guys have been asking how this large scale (but also, small scale – ha!) renovation has been going, I thought I’d share our second dollhouse progress. And if you missed our first tiny house makeover, you can check it out here. Yes, this dollhouse totally reminds all of us of our own house, which has been especially fun. And our nine-year-old daughter has been acting as the general contractor, the interior designer, and the architect, which has also been a blast. From helping with painting and art to choosing colors, arranging the furniture and brainstorming future project ideas – she has been at the helm… WHICH HAS BEEN SO ENJOYABLE FOR MY HOUSE-LOVING

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Our Room For Real Simple’s Idea House

Earlier this month we took the whole family (dog included!) up to Brooklyn for a few days to put together the space we’ve be designing for this year’s Real Simple Idea House over the past five or so months. I realize there’s a lot to unpack in that sentence (especially if you missed our podcast episode or Instagram stories about it) so we’ll catch you up right here and show you the *almost* finished space. And explain what’s still left to be done before their big photoshoot for the magazine and tell you about how some last-minute curveballs actually made the room better. And tell you what they do with everything in the house once

[ Read More ]

| By | |

Before & Afters Of Our Beach House: Upstairs

Many moons ago John shared the beach house before & after photos from downstairs (tons of never before seen angles!) right here in this post. And it has taken us a while (how has it been eight months?!) to get the upstairs before & afters all together so you can see all of those comparisons, and browse the entire second floor of our project, which we are thrilled came together (it was looking ROUGH at the start). So let’s pop upstairs & look around, shall we? Because the transformations were just as big up there… UPSTAIRS HALL & OFFICE Here’s the upstairs hall as you face the front room that we converted into a mini

[ Read More ]

| By | |

A Video Tour Of The Duplex

Finally… we have a full video tour of both sides of the duplex! A ton of people have asked for this (or asked if they missed it) and, well, today is the day. If nothing else, I recommend watching it to see the ecstatic relief on my face at the end that WE. ARE. DONE! Also I talk through a bunch of our changes and choices throughout the reno, and share some of our favorite decisions that upgraded the house in the biggest ways. The video is also just good for seeing how each room flows together, checking out what’s different from side to side, and basically “walking through” the entire project with us. Just

[ Read More ]

| By | |

The Duplex Backyards – Patios, Sheds, & Outdoor Showers Galore!

AT LAST! The backyards of the duplex are DONE DONE DONE! And with basically zero time to spare (our first weeklong summer renters arrive this Saturday and we actually have some early-birds staying on one side right now until Saturday since we finished in the nick of time and they inquired with just enough time to squeeze them in!). There are lots of pics in this post, so I’ll try to keep the words under control – but this is one of our favorite makeovers in the entire renovation. Let’s go back in time for a second to appreciate how far the back of this house has come. This is what it looked like when

[ Read More ]

| By | |

The Last Finished Duplex Spots You Haven’t Seen

We’re back with the (finally!) finished photos of the two small-but-mighty bonus sleeping spaces at the duplex! Plus we’ve got pictures and details of two of the hardest working spaces: the linen closet and our locked owner’s closet that guests won’t see – but you can! In short: these little nooks & crannies GO HARD for us. So we’re excited to show you how they turned out. Since we have two larger bedrooms on each side of the duplex with closets and dressers (you can see them here and here), we refer to these as “bonus sleeping nooks” – which are pretty common around Cape Charles, as well as in other beach communities. They pass

[ Read More ]