Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

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Our First Time Shopping For A Mattress: What We Learned

Believe it or not, the mattress we just purchased for our guest bedroom is the first one either of us have ever really “shopped” for in the traditional sense. Everything before was a hand-me-down from family or purchased for cheap from Goodwill (that’s actually where we got the two daybed mattresses, which were bought pre-bed bugs days – although they did claim to sanitize them before reselling ’em). Oh and of course there’s our organic mattress, which we bought online (amazingly enough, they helped us find the perfect “fit” without having to be there to test things out). So admittedly the task of in-person bed-shopping was a bit daunting at first. We wanted to do

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How We Cut In When Painting A Room

We finished painting the guest room. And boy is it bold. Seriously, it’s like no room we’ve ever painted before. And we luuurve it. With a capital urv. This is probably the most accurate pic (well I guess it’s as accurate as your monitor) of the dark teal that we went with: The color was of course inspired by none other than Sue the Napkin. It’s kind of similar to Dragonfly (the color that we painted the backs of the built-ins in the future dining room) but when we held up a ton of swatches in the guest room we preferred this color (Dragonfly was darker and greener). It’s called Plumage by Martha Stewart, but

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When To Use Tinted Primer

As scheduled, our local Habitat for Humanity ReStore picked up our donation items yesterday. That, combined with us moving tons of frames and accessories into the future playroom (for now), meant the guest bedroom went from this: To this: Not exactly ready for the inlaws (who are arriving on Thursday – yikes) but at least it’s no longer a junkyard. The reason that photo was taken after dark was because once Clara went to bed last night we decided to earn ourselves some brownie points and paint the room. Yup, we’re total suck ups who love extra credit. We figured it’d be easier to paint while it’s empty (the new bed is coming early next week-

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Dog Adjusting To A New House

Some of you have asked how Burger’s getting along in the new house. Short answer: great. Short answer with a fancy Mary-Poppins-ish twist: just splendidly. It only took him a day or two to figure out where his food bowl now lives and which door to wait at when he needs to go out. Other than that, he seems to be having fun discovering (and re-discovering) his favorite spots to hang. Here are some shots from the last two months to document his love for the new casa. This one was taken pretty much right after we moved in. He quickly identified this sun-warmed corner of the rug in the living room and loved to

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Inexpensive Home Decor Ideas

And let’s just say I’m an eternal, unapologetic, and annoyingly chipper optimist. Anyway, we’re back to share the homely group of odd items that we picked up with our $100 shopping budget on our little end-of-winter beach vacay in Rehoboth. Since we were staying at John’s parents’ beach house for free (I have the best inlaws ever), we figured that a hundred dollars to put towards light fixtures and wall decor and other new house items sounded about right to two cheapskates like us who were happy to have saved at least three times that amount by avoiding hotel fees and driving to the beach in the winter instead. Hah. They’re not exactly a group

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Shopping And Thrifting In Rehoboth Delaware

Remember we mentioned on Monday that we were taking it easy and enjoying some family time? Well we were actually at the beach! We snuck away to John’s parents’ beach house in Rehoboth, Delaware for a nice long weekend of R&R (while the guest bedroom took care of itself- just kidding it was just as messy when we returned, darn). We had lots of fun going on long walks, eating seafood, getting our thrift on, and bringing Clara down to the beach on a particularly warm day (it was 65+ degrees on Monday!). So we thought we’d share some of our adventures with you guys. First, we hit up our favorite secondhand shop in Bethany,

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A Round Wood Pedestal Dining Table

First things first. We have a furniture name change to attend to. Our giant 70″ dining table arrived (you know, the one we blathered on and on about here), and he just can’t be called Woody. Because he’s obviously not a he, he’s a she. Given her elegant lines and curvy figure, I don’t know how we ever could have made that mistake. We finally landed on Stella as her new moniker because she’s definitely a stellar addition to the future dining room. Har har. And since we already have Ed (the bed) and Karl (the sectional), I felt like I needed a lady-friend to balance things out. Update: Everyone’s asking about the paint swatches

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A Console Table In A Hallway

Our entry table from the old house naturally landed right next to the front door of the new house too. It has lived there since day one without much second thought. Until recently. Just for fun we moved it to a new spot and ended up liking it there more. It wasn’t a major relocation. It just sorta “drifted” down the hallway a bit. The new spot seems to suit it better for some reason. It’s probably a combination of these 3 things: It moved from an unpainted rough looking space to a painted area that feels more polished. Visions of the previous owners’ furniture linger in our minds (they had a console there too).

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Fab Freebie: Oooh, Shiny!

***This giveaway is no longer accepting entries – scroll down to see who won!*** Thanks to V-Day, we’re straying from our usual home improvement & decor related prizes in favor of some customized and sentimental jewelry from Lisa Leonard Designs. Lisa brings a certain DIY spirit to her necklaces, bracelets, earrings, and other body bling – hand cutting, polishing, and assembling each piece carefully for that “made with love” feeling. She actually helped us celebrate V-day last year by giving away $100 gift cards to two winners – and this year she’s raising the stakes and giving away THREE benjamins worth of her meaningful designs to three random lucky winners. Happy Valentine’s Day indeed. PRIZE:

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U R Sweet

Did you get that candy conversation heart reference in the title? Those things crack me up – especially the new-aged ones that say things like “Text Me” and “Tweet Me.” Hah. Anyway, the point of this post is just to wish everyone a Happy Valentine’s Day. And to share some gratuitous Clara pics. These are actually the same photos that we sent to our family & friends along with a funny little V-day card with a Burger-esque chihuahua on the front (gotta represent for both kids, you know). Heck you guys are friends too, so just pretend these showed up in your mailbox: Gotta love that $1 stuffed candy heart from Target’s dollar spot. Quite

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Thrifting Antique Woven Desk Chairs

These. Are you surprised that we were thrifting again? I’m not. These were originally $90 a pop ($180 total). Marked down to $70 each ($140 total). With an additional 50% off. So we ended up paying just $35 a chair ($70 for both of them). Not bad considering Ballard sells semi similar metal versions for $199 a pop here and reminiscent-ish rattan ones for a whopping $249 a piece here. And they’re sturdy little buggers. I sat in them expecting a rickety mess with flat cushions (why else would they be so cheap?) and I was surprised. Not bad. Not bad at all. So I did that “wow, John, they’re really quite nice” thing and

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Updating An Old Cheese Plate For Christmas

Better Late Than Never? I tackled this project about two months ago before we moved (hence all the pics of our old kitchen counters). But I figured I might as well share it in case someone else comes across their own cheap-o cheese plate and wants to update it with some fun patterned paper. Let’s step into the DeLorean for a nice trip back in time… This little makeover idea was hatched when I laid eyes on this crazy old cheese plate at Goodwill for 40 cents in early December. Yes. Forty cents for the glass dome and the wood base with the ceramic cheese inscription (it was marked as 80 cents and they were

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