Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

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Using A Pressure Washer To Clean Wood, Brick, And Cement

Note: This post features a heavy-duty, gas-powered pressure washer we rented from the store. To see how we now use a $99 electric version we own, please see this Getting Started With Pressure Washing post. Guys. I have a new favorite thing. And no, it’s not a pint-sized plastic vehicle. Yup, we took our spring cleaning to the proverbial next level and rented ourselves a 2000 PSI pressure washer (just got it at the Home Depot in their tool rental department). For 80 bucks and thanks to borrowing my dad’s Kia to haul it, this puppy was all ours for a day. I was happier than a hip hop hamster. I had never used a

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New House Q & A

Holy cow did you guys have questions about the whole selling/moving/buying process since yesterday’s little announcement! So we decided an FAQ post would answer as many as we could. We originally planned to share it tomorrow but you guys are still sending questions our way so furiously that we decided to share this guy today and our regularly scheduled DIY post will go up in the morning. So heeeeeeeere we go! #warningitslong Q: Will you sell your current house by owner like you did with your first house? Since it worked out so well for us last time, we’d love to! So other than possibly paying a few hundred dollars to have it listed on

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Let’s Get A Little Spring Mojo Up In Here

First of all, I’m sending a huge wet internet kiss (yup, you’ll need to wipe your mouth afterwards) to everyone for their awesome excitement and kind words about yesterday’s announcement. We’re freakishly giddy to share this new chapter of our lives with you guys. There may have been misty eyes going on… Speaking of sniffling, can you smell that smell? It’s spring Pinterest Challenge time (not sponsored by Pinterest or anyone else, just dreamed up by Katie Bower to make us stop pinning and start doing). The whole thing started nearly two years ago when Katie called me to say that she thought we should challenge ourselves to make one thing each season that’s inspired

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Aquatoberpril (A Water-Drinking Challenge)

Don’t worry, I don’t know how to pronounce that blog post title either. It’s just a nod to the fact that my  “Aquatober” challenge – where I try to spend the entire month of October drinking water instead of soda and other sugary drinks – has extended itself all the way through April. Hence, Aquatoberpril. In my original post about Aquatober I noted that I have varying success every year I try to detox myself (and my wallet) on all of the soda I consume (it’s my liquid vice of choice). Some years I don’t make it the full month. Some years I make it a bit further. Well, this time I’m still going strong

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We Bought A New House!

So, funny story about the house below. We bought it and we’re moving in. We know this news probably evokes a whole range of reactions. Excitement for new makeovers. Sadness for leaving our current house. Curiosity about all of the logistics. Confusion. Anger. The inexplicable urge to do The Carlton. Starting this story requires rewinding seven years, back to our first house hunting experience in Richmond in the spring of 2006. We had just moved from New York City and Richmond real estate felt very spacious and very cheap by comparison. It made dreamers out of us. We checked out a bunch of neighborhoods, and fell for an awesome old area with nice big wooded

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Fab Freebie: Party Time

***This giveaway is no longer accepting entries – see who won below!*** The randomly selected party girl (or guy) this week is… Mackenzie (who said “In 2 weeks I am attending a welcome home party for the return of two very close friends who just got done completing service in The Dominican Republic through The Peace Corp!”). Congrats! Clara’s turning three in two short weeks, which means our minds are shifting into birthday party mode. And to get the celebration started early, we’re dishing out $500 worth of festive party supplies to one lucky winner. First we have $250 to SmashCake And Co, where you can stock up on everything from pretty paper straws to

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How To Build A Garage Pergola

Parking our car got a little more scenic this weekend with the completion of our carport pergola. Or, cargola (pergolaport?) if you will. Last week we talked about dressing up our carport with the help of some pergola plans from Workbench Magazine. The plans took a lot of the guesswork out of it, but there was still plenty of actual work. All-in-all it took about 4.5 days of work (the half day was spent picking up the materials, which we talked about here) but I’m gonna boil it down to one simple post. So here we go.   What you need to know is that there were four main parts to this building project: 1)

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A Dark Gray Nursery With A Tree Mural & Striped Curtains

This nursery that Dave and Carrie created for their daughter had us smiling from the second we saw the first picture. Not only is it bold and playful, it also has some sweet personal touches and a lot of handmade/DIYed goodness going on. Here’s their letter: Hey S & J, We recently welcomed our first child into the world, Everly Harper. Before we even knew Ever (that’s what we will lovingly call her), we knew we didn’t want a typical nursery for her – and we definitely didn’t want anything close to what the room looked like when we bought the place. My wife was inspired by a woodland themed nursery that we found through

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Our $51 Bathroom Makeover

The guest bath = so much cuter. That sweet little space reminds me that even small seemingly “stuck” spaces can shine with a few easy upgrades, like fresh paint, a new window treatment, some art, and a few mixed and matched accessories. Sometimes it’s fun to embrace an old feature like vintage yellow tile (complete with a floor that looks like a scrabble board) instead of hammer-drilling it out of there. So stick a fork in this baby… for around $50, she’s a whole lot easier on the eyes. The room has this casual Anthropologie-ish vibe now, which isn’t usually something I’m very good at pulling off – so all the credit goes to the

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Planning And Prepping A Carport Pergola

What carport? This carport. You know, the one that almost kept us from considering this house because we were so anti-carport? My how we’ve changed our tune after spending a few years with it… Sherry actually mentioned the new tune we’re signing back in this Listy McListerson post: “we originally wanted to convert this into a garage, but now we’re leaning towards adding a trellis arch so it’s all lush and pretty like a carport with a pergola instead of being closed in and dark like a garage (we’d lose some light from two windows into the laundry room and office if we closed it in).” The lost windows were a big game changer, since

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Hanging Bamboo Blinds

It’s Gettin Hot In Hur, So Add Some Bamboo Blinds. I am, getting so hot, I’m gonna put some blinds uuup. Picture me singing that while installing each of these four blinds. On repeat. While John rolled his eyes. Actually it was less about heat and more about that ever-elusive p word: privacy. Just during the day (we don’t use the sunroom at night) but it’s hard to make a room with an entire wall of windows feel private and cozy. So we reasoned that bamboo blinds + the fence that we added outside for our patio (which you can see through the windows here thanks to this photography trick from Kate) just might do

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Fab Freebie: Getting ‘Toned

***This giveaway is now closed – see who won below!*** And the lucky winner of some Pantone-tastic paint is… Gretchen (who’s really into “robin’s egg blue with a few pops of tangerine”). Congrats! Y’all have heard of a little thing called Pantone, right? Well the folks who declared Emerald the color of the year have a slew of color experts who have also inspired a line of paint. And our bloggy friend/decorative painter Kristen clued us into MyColor inspired by Pantone – which is a series of project-sized paints for furniture, accessories, walls and beyond. In addition to the cool clear packaging, these quarts of eggshell paint (which are sold online and at Lowe’s) are

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