October is officially here, but before we dive into another month of projects, it always helps us keep the ol’ momentum up to take an appreciative look back on all of our happenings from last month – everything from making over Granny’s bathroom and building a train board to making some tables into ottomans and celebrating our 5th blogging anniversary. And since we love to throw in something never-before-seen, we’re actually revealing the first stop on our book tour below. So here’s everything in our usual weird yearbook-superlative-style that definitely inspires us to keep plugging away (plus it makes browsing our archives a lot easier – you can read back through January of 2011 right here in just 20 posts instead of 700). Hootie hoo for September in review.
Most Surprising: Considering how much we loved the blue metal stools in our kitchen, it was surprising (even to us) when these craigslist finds wormed their way into our lives. Thankfully we’ve got a plan for the blue stools (involving our sunroom) since these swiveling guys are our new favorite things.
Biggest / Most Gradual Transformation: Our bedroom, which has come a long way since we first moved in. But it took a while to get there, which is why we documented its evolution in this picture-filled post for ya. The lesson? Don’t despair if things aren’t done the first week, month, or even year that you move in.
Biggest Missed Opportunity to Make A Quad City DJs Reference: This post about building a train board for Clara (that the music-fueled Sherry somehow failed to entitle “C’mon Ride The Train”). It’s like I don’t even know her anymore…
Video Killed The Comment Section: Despite some requests for a post about how we make our videos, this lengthy post might have had ten comments in the first hour. Perhaps I overestimated how geeky our readers were. What? You don’t want to hear about my high school obsession with a camcorder?
Creepiest Project: It’s not even Halloween yet, but we’re already decorating with dead things. At least it was a pretty dead thing: this butterfly that Sherry (and Clara) found in our yard – which found a place on our bookshelf. Update: it’s still going strong and looks the same – although we’ve been meaning to add a glass dome over it just to protect it a little more.
Toughest Decision: Finally giving up on our craigslist dining room chairs and getting some deeply discounted new chairs to take their place. We love the new look, but it was kind of a bummer to not be able to make the other ones work. Ah well, live and learn.
Biggest Oops: Breaking our camera when it fell off of a board I was sawing. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it gave us an excuse to get a new camera which also does HD video. Speaking of which…
Oddest Couple: Me and Sherry, who shot this latest house tour video with our new camera as a two-some. I held the camera (since Sherry is Miss Shakes-A-Lot when it comes to video) and she narrated behind me. Yep, this is a fancy operation over here.
Biggest Relief: Finally being able to unveil this promo video for our book, which we shot back in March (but then had to keep our lips sealed for months). Even better, we finally got to reveal some of the secret book projects that we did back in January…
Most Burger Approved: This little ottoman upgrade in our bedroom where we repurposed some old X-based side tables to create new stools at the end of our bed (they’re our version of doggy steps so Burger can climb into bed).
Most Likely To Require Eating Lots of Tomato Soup: This project, using the special edition Warhol Campbell’s Soup cans at Target. A little cork board to soften the metal edges, some colored pencils, and voila! Update: we did successfully consume all of the soup. Woot.
Most Uplifting: Our visit to my Granny’s house in West Virginia, where we spent a work-filled weekend updating her downstairs powder room. It was a bit tiring, but we left feeling nothing but elated.
Biggest 24 Hour Improvement: Granny’s bathroom, which was already looking worlds better by the end of day #2 (thanks to some paint, a new floor, and tidying up a lot of rough spots in the room).
Breakout Star: This has to go to Granny herself, who seemed to earn herself quite a few new fans when we revealed her new bathroom to her (on video). And I can’t tell you how happy it makes me that you guys saw exactly why we love her so much.
Most Academic Shopper: Sherry, who wrote this post about how she finds deals on clothes and keeps her wardrobe in check (you guys seemed to really like the idea of giving your clothing a grade, btw). Closet GPA, for the win.
Biggest Rivalry: We did a fun little side-by-side comparison of the rooms in our first house and their counterparts in this house. And yep, we even chose winners. The final tally of wins may be closer than you’d expect…
Littlest Updates: We made four small changes around the house – like installing another dual-flusher in the guest bathroom and creating a hidden spot for our shredder (below).
Longest Graphic: The images in our posts are usually less than 400 or 500 pixels tall, but we made an extreme exception when we created a graphic timeline depicting our history from 2004 as a way to kick off our 5th blogivesary. That thing clocked in at over 4100 pixels long!
Most Ordinary: The day we shared as our usual blogiversary “day in the life” post. It might not be everybody’s normal, but it’s a pretty regular weekday around these parts.
Biggest Conspiracy Theory: People became quite curious about the “tragic event” that robbed poor Olivia the pig of one of her ears (which we mentioned in this blogiversary post about some YHL facts and figures). The story? Clara just bent it back and forth until it snapped off. Oh the humanity.
Most Scene-Stealing: Clara & Burger, who got their own little Blogiversary Q&A video this year, which had folks just as captivated (if not more so) than the video of me and Sherry answering personal questions that you guys asked.
Most Nostalgic: Going back through our archives and plucking out some favorites (and least favorites – like this image that won for “Worst Photo”).
Most Ambitious: Stating our goals for our next year of blogging – which we do every blogiversary, sometimes with limited success. This year we’re hoping to embrace the crazy, mix up our posting style, write shorter posts among those beefier long ones, and incorporate you guys more. Let’s see how we do…
Most Graphic: This blogiversary post showing the results of our little reader survey. I had some fun making the infographics, and I believe the consensus was that Beyonce makes any chart better.
Most Likely To Make Pigs Fly: The first stop of our book tour (which kicks off in less than 3 weeks!) in the city of the flying pig: Cincinnati, Ohio. We’re so pumped to reveal the full 17-city list tomorrow morning!
How did September shape up for you? Did you get any major projects completed? Try your hand at a makeover for someone else? Celebrate any special anniversaries/milestones? Or just have fun photoshopping your head onto things like a foosball table?
Paige P @ LPD says
So cool you’ll be in my city first! Cincinnati is pretty awesome, I don’t know how long you’ll be here but here’s some cool stuff you guys should probably check out.
http://senatepub.com/ – delicious gastropub, seriously the best hot dogs ever!
http://www.parkandvine.com/ – Green living store, right up your alley
http://www.cincymuseum.org/unionterminal – great museum, plus just an awesome building
http://www.americanlegacytours.com/?q=tours/queen-city-underground – Tour of cincinnati underground. We have tons of tunnels, an abandoned subway, and really cool 1800’s underground brewery infrastructure.
http://washingtonpark.org/directions/ – our beautiful and newest park
http://www.findlaymarket.org/ – amazing open air market, one of the oldest in the country.
http://www.coffee-emporium.com/ – locally roasted coffee!
http://smarterthanagoldfish.com/ – Sustainable and locally made art supplies and handmade shoes.
http://mainlyart.com/new_design/index.cfm & http://www.duckcreekantiquemall.com/ – a mid century modern store and good antique mall right next to each other.
http://sewnstudio.com/ – A great independant fabric store, that stocks a lot of hard to find designer fabrics.
Whoops, got a little carried away! But really it’s a great city, I could go on for days.
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks for the suggestions, Paige!
-John
Jessie @ Cape 27 says
Shut up… Cincinnati is my hometown! You guys just made my entire month! I would never have guessed we’d make the cut, let alone number one. Looks like an awesome festival. We’ll definitely be making our way down to see the famous J&S! Any chance you guys are looking to squeeze in some house crashing?? Can’t wait to get our book!
YoungHouseLove says
Yes, we’d love to house crash while we’re touring! Definitely email us some photos and we’ll see if the schedule allows it!
xo
s
Lindsey says
The picture in this post of your bedroom just reminded me! Not sure if you looked at Joss & Main lately, but your new bedroom rug was on their site. I think price for the same size you have in your room was around $750!
YoungHouseLove says
No way!!
xo
s
Sarah H. says
Happy Blogoversary! My husband and I celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary in September. Can’t wait to see the rest of your book tour list!
YoungHouseLove says
Aw, thanks Sarah!
xo
s
Dawn G. says
So excited for you to come to Cincy!! I live across the river in KY, but work in Downtown Cincinnati (only about a 5 mile commute).
I LOVE your blog! Can’t wait to see you guys and I hope you have a great time here!!
Dawn G. says
I forgot to say – the day you are here is my 5 year wedding anniversary, so hopefully my hubby won’t mind coming to see you guys!!!
YoungHouseLove says
Wahoo! I say you guys wear your wedding outfits and carry a bouquet and we’ll renew your vows for you. It will be awesome.
xo
s
Bonnie says
What type of plants are in your planters now? I remember that you had killed some sort of bushes, then moved on to mums, and then to boxwoods. I seem to kill everything in my planters too (most recently boxwoods). Please tell me you have finally found the perfect planter bushes!
YoungHouseLove says
We have boxwoods in them now and they’re still alive! It’s a miracle!
xo
s
Allison says
the world is smiling upon me! i grew up in cincinnati and will be coming home to visit my family that weekend.
if burger needs a friend, my bichon rory is very social.
YoungHouseLove says
Haha – cute!
xo
s
Sara says
I’ve checked your blog like twenty times this morning (even though I KNOW I’M EARLY) because I’m so excited for your book tour announcement! :D
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, thanks Sara!
xo
s
Meredith says
Me too Sara! I swear, this is just like the day I was waiting for the bar results to post…
Amy says
Oh man, I can’t wait to see your list tomorrow! Really hoping there’s somewhere in upstate New York on the list. If you don’t get a chance to try the Skyline Chili I will TOTALLY make some and bring it to you!
We didn’t get much accomplished with the house in September, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and have been recovering from a fairly awful flare for 6 weeks or so. Our roommates are moving out (we finally have our house to ourselves for the first time since we bought it over a year ago!) and the month of October will be spent making the spare room our office.
YoungHouseLove says
MMMmmmm, anyone who brings us food = bffs for real. Hahah!
xo
s
Elizabeth @Food Ramblings says
I must have missed the tomato soup post…wonder if they still have them at Target :)
Emily says
Holy Moly! I cannot wait for you to come to Cincinnati! Gahhhhhhhh I will totally be there!
Christine says
HAHA! This post made my morning!!! I read it on the way in (on the train- funny enough) and was one of the people who suggested your title for the train post be “C’mon ride the train” so it made me feel super cool. I hope it wasn’t too disappointing, Sherry!!
Melanie P. says
Our dog chewed off BOTH of Olivia’s ears. Poor little pig. He also eats the legs off all of the Barbie dolls. ;) Legs and ears only, arms and heads are safe.
Sue says
Somehow I missed Sherry’s post about her wardrobe, but I read it yesterday and it brought a question to mind. You’ve probably answered this one several times. How do you keep your photos organized, so you can go back and pull them for a post like that one? Thank you!!
YoungHouseLove says
We back everything up on our external hard drive and also store all photos on our blog on a cloud server, so we can go get them from there as well.
xo
s
Emily says
YAY! I’m so excited you’re coming to Cincinnati :-) I told my husband my favorite bloggers are coming to town and he asked “the ones with the little girl and the burger?” haha We also have a chihuahua so I guess that helped him remember. ;-) I may have to be a bad girl and skip classes that day so I can meet you!
YoungHouseLove says
Hahaha!
xo,,
s
Jess says
I wonder if I’m the only one who gets a kick out of seeing my postcard every time you refer back to a pic of your old office/guest room! Mine’s the farthest right one on the 2nd shelf up… the BU bridge here in good old Boston… where I’ll now get to meet you so soon!! Can’t wait! :)
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, I love that!
xo
s
Marg says
Hi,
I am a new fan yay!! I am in love with your design guys oh wait of course I love clara and burger ;)
julie says
LOVE the pendant lights on the kitchen–where did u get them???
YoungHouseLove says
Those are from the Shades of Light Outlet in Richmond (The Decorating Outlet). Hope it helps!
xo
s