Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

Posts by Sherry Petersik

Sherry Petersik is one half of the duo behind the award-winning home improvement and do-it-yourself design blog, Young House Love. Together, she and her husband John 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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Turning An Armoire Into A Fountain!

When Samantha over at one of our regular blog reads sent us an amazing armoire redo (just wait to see what she turned it into), we had to share her insanely inspired DIY undertaking. Here’s her letter: It’s probably too late in the year for an outdoor space before and after, but here’s our armoire-to-fountain makeover. The outside of the fountain is painted with weather-resistant paint. The inside tanks are coated with roofing sealant. The fountain pump is from Home Depot. It makes a wonderful refreshing sound that drowns out the traffic and (almost) the constant helicopters that hover overhead every evening. – Samantha That’s right. She turned her old pine armoire into a fountain! Here’s

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Making Bifold Doors Into A Screen To Hide A Water Heater

We know this was supposed to be the final chapter when it comes to our big basement makeover, but because we tackled two different DIY projects (making a screen to block off our fugly water heater and frosting the windows for 100% privacy that still lets in the light) we realized it would be crazy to try to squeeze all those step by step photos and instructions into one post… so we’re breaking it down to two. Just look at it as twice the fun. So without further ado, here’s how we made a custom screen to hide our eye-sore of a water heater with $18 worth of secondhand bi-fold doors and a quart of

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Our Holly Jolly Christmas Gift Guide

Just like last year’s roundup of budget-friendly holiday gifts, we’re back to share what tickled our fancy this year. So we set off to three mainstream stores that hopefully many of you have access to (if not there’s always online ordering) and snapped a few pics of our favorite non-fund-depleting finds. The best part is that many of them can be had for just a few dollars and nothing in our roundup is over the 20-something range. Plus some of these items can be adapted or DIYed so you can whip them up for even less at home. Doesn’t that put some seasonal spring in your step? So without further ado, here’s what made us

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Sourcing Tile, A Vanity, & Other Bathroom Accessories

As John mentioned on Monday, our full bathroom is in need of the full monty. Sure it’s great from afar… … but up close it’s a bit more, um, not great. Sadly, after over fifty years of use, the once wonderful black and white basketweave floor tiles are cracked, stained, and worn down beyond repair… … and the white tiled walls are in pretty scary shape (shattered in some areas and dingy and worn almost everywhere else). We’re all about saving what you can and working with whatcha got, but in this case we’re sorry to say that after a pretty serious cleaning and recaulking effort a few years back- which certainly tided us over

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Abbey’s Living Room Makeover With A Red Sofa

Oh happy day! Abbey sent us her lovely mood board after pictures and we couldn’t wait to share them. Her space is a great reminder that you don’t have to paint the walls a dramatically different color or spend big bucks replacing everything to get a majorly upgraded look. Sometimes just a few new pieces, a slightly more saturated wall tone, and some simple accessory switcheroos can make all the difference. Here’s her letter: I’m finally submitting my after pics of the family room makeover you helped me with this summer. I want to thank you sooo much for your design ideas. By adding in the chocolate furnishings and the rug it really helped provide

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How To Make Dried Orange Slice Ornaments

We’re back to share the second half of our tree-decorating adventure (sped up with a bit of festive music to get you into the spirit). We last left off with this video of us setting up our pre-lit artificial (faux? reusble?) tree only to discover that a strand of lights in the middle of the tree was out. But fixing it was as easy as listening for the buzzing bulb and replacing it with one of the extras they included along with our tree. Then it was time for the ornaments, and this year we decided to deviate from our usual white/glass/silver scheme (seen here). Maybe it was a weird citrus-pregnancy-craving-inspired decision, but out of

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How Wall Color Can Affect Your Mood

Now that my bun in the oven is totally “out” (there’s nothing like announcing it to the world at large) I’m liberated to admit things like “lately I’ve been reading nursery decorating books.” And my favorite one so far is Feathering The Nest by Tracy Hutson. But wait, don’t tune out yet all of you non-baby people… Because not only is it packed with gorgeous eye candy (much of which is totally green and intentionally geared towards stimulating baby’s brain and keeping children’s safety in mind), it also has lots of interesting researched information, like a detailed write up about the impact of color. And it’s not just baby-skewed. Many of the color studies were

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Organizing Our Paint Cans In The Basement

We’re back with our weekly basement update and since we’re edging closer towards the best word ever (finished!) this week’s project is quick and easy. It actually has to do with that built-in cabinet (to the right of the Ikea workstation) that we painted white last week. Remember it was bare but we promised we had a storage idea in the queue for you guys? Well, here it is… Yup, those are matching paint cans. And yes, we’re ok with you calling us nerds. We’ve actually been meaning to move our paint from the garage to the basement for a while. It’s a lot more temperate thanks to its underground location (it stays cooler in

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DIYing A Paver Patio In The Backyard

Even though spring is a ways off, Sara’s before and after pictures had us feeling all sunny and cheerful. Here’s her letter: I’m a longtime reader of your blog, and I have a big Reader Redesign for you. My fiancé and I bought our house last summer and have slowly been fixing it up. I’m so excited to share our biggest project to date: a DIY paver patio. We got a quote from a contractor that wanted around $8200 for the job! We decided to do the work ourselves, and also add a wall for extra seating. With no experience. And only two weeks to get it done before our big summer party. Yikes! We

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10 Inexpensive Home Updates That Make A Big Difference

There are definitely some projects that we’ve taken on (and hired out) along with a few accessories that we’ve brought home that stand out in our mind as particularly worthwhile, especially because they were all around $100 (some much less, some a bit more) and they made a heckova difference in our casa’s function and form department. Without further ado, our top ten list: 1. Widening the two doorways between the living room, the kitchen and the den (we paid a mason around $100 to help us with the den wall since it’s load bearing and had an electrician help us widen the living room wall since there were some wires in the way- also

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Painting An Old Wood Cabinet With White Paint

When Michelle sent over her fab furniture makeover we had to share her mouthwatering before and after pics. Here’s her letter: About a month ago I found your site by accident and completely fell in love with it! You’ve even inspired me to start my own blog! I could go on and on but I don’t wanna waste your precious time cuz you guys are busy little bees. I just wanted to show you a piece of eye candy that I re-designed! I bought this dresser off of craigslist.org for only $20! Then I painted it white, slapped some new hardware on it and replaced those bar looking things on the doors with glass. Isn’t it amazing what a little updating can do? Hope

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How To Add Gift Wrap To Clear Glass Doors

We’re back with our weekly basement update (here’s where we left off) and this week we painted the dingy built-in cabinet, added some art, obscured the semi-sheer doors to our armoires and brought in a bevy of bins to organize everything we have on hand (and everything we’re sure we’ll acquire down the line- now there’s lots of room to grow). Here’s just a taste of the latest updates: But before we get to all the dirty details we owe a huuuuuge thank you to the wonderful peeps at True Value who made a lot of this week’s undertakings possible thanks to their generous gift card (which we’ve been using left and right these days).

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