Peaceful Morning

A peaceful morning... it is, indeed, today.
After more than one year, I scrapped a layout. Some things that troubled me have passed, so I thought to get artistically creative again.  No stress, no pressure.  Just peace.

Browsing through (how much time had passed since I last did that!) various challenge blogs, the best option was to go back scrap-home: 7 Dots Studio. The July challenge is about beauty, serenity and peace.  Green meadows, purple flowers, neat white interiors and lots of my favourite colour: teal/turquoise.  How could I resist at it?

So I pulled one of my favourite 7 Dots Studio papers: Love is in the air - Just dreaming, even though I believe the Garden Party collection would suit perfectly, a wonderful handwriting 7 Dots stencil and some embellishments.

My layout is based, like I already said, on the 7 Dots July Challenge Moodboard

I hope you like my take on the challenge! I enjoyed myself very much creating it!

Have a nice day and maybe I will return here soon...

¬Melenia

Take note of the blessings

Hello!
Today I felt like scrapping a bit, after seeing the Scrapki-wyzwaniowo March Challenge.  From time to time I take a look at the current challenges and trends in the scrapbooking world, because the truth is... I have missed this world a lot.
The creations I saw from the DT poked and reminded me of how creative I felt when I scrapped.  So I thought to play along with the girls.  Thanks for the inspiration, ladies!

This is what I came up with

The challenge is to incorporate NUMBERS in our creation, in any form we like.  

What I did was use the numbers as a theme (count our blessings and be grateful to God for them) and as an element of my page.  I pulled a lovely paper, stickers and die-cuts from the 7 Dots Studio "Lost & Found" Collection, which happens to be an all-time favourite.  So I hope you like my page!

Remember to count your blessings and have in mind that there are many people in this world who lack them!

Have a nice day! Thanks for stopping by!

Break free - a canvas

Hello my friends!
Today I want to show you a canvas I made.
When it comes to these little art pieces, I feel that I'm just a beginner so I thought to get some experience by practice (practice is ALWAYS a good idea!).

I happened to see a lovely Mixed Media Place moodboard the other day and it became my starting point.  I got inspired by the butterfly of the top left photo and the softness of the moodboard in general. As the message of my canvas is "break free" (which means that it needs to have an airy feel), I tried to give motion to the creation by making a light blue trail on the right - like a soft breeze that blows on the cluster from the left and takes everything with it.

Lots of 13 arts media (of course), as you see

some details

The Mixed Media place moodboard

I think I could do better than this, but as I said, experience is achieved by constant practice.  

Now that I'm examining it more thoroughly, I believe that I should correct a few details. 

But I'm ok with it, as it is!

Anyway, I hope you like it.  So that's everything for now!  Have a beautiful day!

Love is worth waiting for

Good morning!
Yesterday Berry71Bleu published my guest-designer's take on the lovely March Challenge.
It is an honour to be invited as a special guest in an amazing challenge blog, such as Berry71Bleu. Thank you very much, ladies! 

So today I thought to share my layout here as well.

My page

and the Berry71Bleu March moodboard

This page was inspired by a very dear friend of mine, Tusia Lech, who is also the designer of the 7 Dots Studio Verano Azul Collection.  I had her in my mind while making it - I guess that's why this page came out as a very delicate, soft, tender and elegant creation.

So as love is the biggest and most valuable emotion a human can experience, it is worthy of our patience. Believe in love and it will come to you. This is what I think.

I had mentioned in a previous post here that I intend to make less loaded pages. I'm happy that this one is not full of small details and mixed-media techniques. I'm trying to prove to myself that I can be more minimalistic lol.

I want to submit this page to the current 7 Dots Studio challenge, whose theme is EMOTIONS. I will take part in it as a contestant, not as a member of the DT - a nice first time :).

Look at the inspirational circle

So I hope this layout inspires you to talk about love and wait for love and create about love. It is much needed lately...

Have a nice weekend!

2 scoops of ice-cream

Good morning...
Here I am again to share a page I created today for the More than Words March challenge.
A really messy one. I mixed up a lot of different media (gesso, mists, a pencil, glitter) and my hands got dirty - actually they have several patches of brown, teal and green inks.

I chose to talk about little pleasures in life that can be very blissful :).
One of them is mocha ice-cream.  I just adore it. Whenever I have some, I feel like I'm in heaven! I love the flavours of coffee and chocolate together! So 2 scoops of mocha ice-cream are just a little bit of magic for me...

I pulled my elements and paper from the 7 Dots Studio Thoughtskeeper Collection which I mainly combined with a modern photo as well as with lots of 13 Arts white gesso.  I always use this one instead of modelling paste, it works better for me, as it's thick and steady.  So I put some on my title and then added gold glitter on it. I also used it with 2 stencils for extra texture.

Like I already said, I was inspired by the More than Words March challenge.

I hope you like my page! Thank you very much for visiting my blog and for your beautiful comments.  They are much appreciated!

Inspire

Hello hello!
A quick post before I leave for work, in order to share a page I just made (inspiration knocked my door today) :)

I played with the 7 Dots Studio Yuletide Collection, though the theme of my page is not Christmas-y. I combined red, brown and bright blue (colours that are strong and intense) and talked about the glitter that we have inside our souls and that we should let shine out from time to time. It will surely inspire people.  As you see the photo is quite modern and the feel of the collection somewhat vintage. But yes, 7 Dots Studio Collections make miracles and can combine both styles. Love you, 7 Dots Studio!

I based my layout on the following sketch from Anna's Scrap March challenge, 

that I flipped to the right

Ok that's everything for now!

I will be back in a couple of days to share another page!

Have an awesome day!

Coffee time

Good morning everyone!
It's been almost 2 months since my last post here.
I didn't mean it to happen, but life is always unpredictable.


The reality in everyday life here in Greece has been even tougher the last 3-4 months, for the Greek people as well as the refugees that are stuck/locked/stranded here.  The countries that create the mess in these people's homelands just refuse to give shelter/accept/take care of them- how responsible is this, eh?  I could say a lot more on this subject but we all KNOW what's going on.

I need to say, though, that I'm very proud that most of my fellow Greeks, despite their hard economic problems and their struggle to survive, HELP the refugees by providing food, clothes, toys and play for the kids, medicines. I expected nothing less than that from them. It's just majestic.  I know that some of the refugees are going to be sent/distributed in my island soon, so I'm looking forward to helping them alongside with the other citizens of Greece.

So yesterday, in order to distract myself a bit from all these hard situations, I scrapped.
I made a colorful and playful page, having focused on this special time of the day, when we all sit and have COFFEE (with some delicious croissants, from time to time)! For me, that time is after I wake up.  Coffee is pure bliss, don't you agree?

So this is my layout

As you probably already noticed, I avoided layering and overloading.  This is something I intend to do even more in my next layouts. So the most prominent feature here is the word stickers.  And because I am a 7 Dots Studio girl, I worked with the Verano Azul Collection again. :)

Verano Azul - Dazzle me

Verano Azul - Word Stickers

Verano Azul - Tags

Verano Azul - Stickers

Verano Azul - Die cuts

The reason I chose this collection over the others is the fact that it contains all the beautiful colours the Lindy's Stamp Gang March challenge palette requires:

So I used the following mists:

Cotton Candy Pink

Steampunk Sepia

Time Travel Teal

I also played with Crafty Life March Challenge which is actually a bingo challenge.

I used the far right vertical combination Patterned Paper/Die-cuts/Flowers.  Apart from those, it's evident that I used some mists and chipboard, too.

Chipboards	Lace/ Ribbons	Patterned Paper (s)
Rubons	Mists	Die Cuts
Stamps	Crystals	Flowers

That's all from me now! I hope you have a great week and remember to be thankful for all you are given. Nothing  in life is to be taken for granted.

Dreamer

Hello hello!
Here I am again... today it seemed like a good day to play with a challenge.
So I browsed through my challenge blogs list and I noticed that More than Words January main challenge has a very interesting one.  Its theme is Personality & Selfie.

I happened to have one selfie that I took one and a half year ago, so I thought "why not".
It's not easy at all to illustrate one's personality in just one layout, therefore I decided to focus on just one aspect of my profile.

I am a dreamer. I dream to excel at many things. I'm never satisfied with my achievements, my knowledge, myself. I dream to become more than I am everyday.  Frankly I don't know how realistic all these are, I guess I'm a bit nuts lol.

Anyway I tried to create a page wherein someone could see this trait of mine in a vintage, classic, dark, not too bold, but full of small details style. Again, I aimed at grace, harmony, balance and elegance (of course the latter is not news, I always want that in my creations).

I used the 7 Dots Studio "Lost & Found" collection.  And 13 Arts media.

I think it's time for me to experiment with a more modern style in my layout.  I hope (or shall I say dream?) I will manage to make a clean & simple, modern page soon.

Until then... have awesome days! And be dreaming!

Take a deep breath and....

... open the door of your soul.  You will find sparkle and shine inside.

This is what I would like to do in 2016.
And it is the theme of the layout I made in order to tell just that.

Of course I have used 7 Dots Studio products again (Soulmates).

I admit that it's a bit overloaded with bits'n'pieces, I guess that having quite some time to scrap, I needed to unleash all the scrap energy I had stored (lol).  As I'm comparing this page with my previous one, I realize that the amount of embellishments I put on a cardstock usually depends on my mood. A form of expression, too, isn't it? Very artistically talkative I was this time indeed.

Ok without further ado

Since I hadn't scrapped for some weeks, I drew inspiration from the following Berry71Bleu Moodboard (January Challenge)

The combination of black/blue/green is AWESOME.

That's everything from me for now, I guess!
Until next time.... take a deep breath, open the door of your soul and look into it!


Thanks for stopping by!

Live simply

Hello, hello!

Back with some scrapping today.
A simple, not overloaded layout I really enjoyed making it, because it was the result of a bet with myself. I thought to share my train of thought while creating my page, I hope you find it useful.

Ok this is the story:
My friend and owner of ScrapsNPieces store, Myrto sent me an awesome, big package a couple of months ago (when I still was a member of the ScrapsNPieces DT).  This nice package had been left aside for a while, so today I thought to grant it a bit of my attention, as I really felt I needed to scrap. So I opened it and my fingers went through all the beautiful stuff Myrto had sent me.  And then a question popped up.  "Can you create a layout with colours of the goodies that are in the package?".  "Oh yes, sure", I thought.

When I looked at the colours of the sprays that my friend had chosen, I found the following:

                               

Great!

INTERESTING COMBINATION, don't you think?

I don't believe Myrto had this combo in mind when putting the little bottles in the box, I guess it was randomly done.

I could use the three of them, but all of them???

Anyway, this was the challenge.  I loved loved loved loved the second colour (iced spruce), so it just HAD to dominate the layout.  The black soot was to be added in very small doses, ok with that. Now the problem was how I would combine two colours that seem like not getting along with each other with two cold colours  and not create an eye-hurting colourful circus. This troubled me a little bit.   Finally I decided to mix the rusty hinge with the festive berries and spray the chipboard Myrto sent with them.  Risky, but it looked like the only option.

And this page is the result of this

What do you think?  As you see, I used some substantial amount of water on my cardstock, in order to create the watercolor effect on the background.  Now the best white/cream cardstock that withstands so much water is this one

Χαρτι watercolor 300gsm

which you can find at the ScrapsNPieces store

I also used this stamp

along with the chipboard, Tim Holtz mask and 7 Dots Studio Lost & Found Collection that you see in my page.

Now because I had quite some time to scrap, I drew my inspiration to build the layout from the following C'est Magnifique sketch:

I think it is just lovely, do you agree?

So that's everything from me now! I hope you liked my page!

Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas blessings

Good morning everyone!

Today I would like to share with you one of my two last pages as a 7 Dots Studio DT member. There is only one more, that you will see in a couple of days!  I decided to step down from the DT and I already feel nostalgic. As I'm typing these lines I still don't believe it. It was not easy at all to make such decision, but given the circumstances it was a right one.

I need to thank Tusia Lech for believing in my scrapping skills 2,5 years ago. I will be forever thankful for the trust, love and kindness she has showed me all this time.  7 Dots Studio collections have been a huge inspiration and have accompanied me throughout my scrapbooking journey. They were the reason why I won challenges and my pages got known by people.  Therefore I would like to express my love and gratitude to this girl and I would like to meet her one day in person! Tusia Lech, thank you!

So in my last page for the 7 Dots Studio blog, I wanted to talk about BLESSINGS and GRATITUDE.

Christmas for me is a time to reflect on all the blessings God gave the world, when He sent His only Son to save the world. A time to be grateful for everything He has granted us.  I chose a Pinterest photo that depicts abundance, at least this is what I see in it.  So my layout had to be full and rich in texture, depth and colour. And this is what I have tried to do, I hope you can see these elements in my layout.  I used the awesome Yuletide Collection - what else could fit more?  The colour combo is the colours I usually like for Christmas decorations - I don't go traditional, this deep purple, gold and rich red convey exactly my feelings during the Christmas season.

7 Dots products used: Yuletide - Sugarplum; Yuletide - Tags 12x12; Yuletide - Word Stickers 6x12; Yuletide - Element Stickers 6x12; UWS - Lost & Found Handwriting Stencil; UWS - Yuletide Flairs

I also got inspired by the Scrap Around the World November moodboard, that is all about Christmas, the most wonderful time of the year. I kept its grey/silver colour for my background, although like I already said, I opted for richer and deeper colours.

I hope you like my page! One more is coming in soon! 

Thank you for visiting my blog!  

Soul Search

Καλημέρα και Καλό μήνα!

Φθινόπωρο επιτέλους... ααααχχχχχ!!!
Φύλλα που πέφτουν (όχι εδώ, σε άλλες περιοχές), δυνατοί αέρηδες.... ψύχρα, συννεφα, γκρίζος ουρανός.... ΤΕΛΕΙΑ!

Οπότε δεν γίνεται παρά η πρόκληση Νοεμβρίου του ScrapsNPieces να έχει φθινοπωρινό θέμα!

"Autumn Colours" λοιπον...

(δεν είναι απαραίτητο να ακολουθήσετε επακριβώς τα χρώματα, οκ; απλά θέλουμε έργο με φθινοπωρινό θέμα)

Όπως έχω πει ήδη, η 7 Dots Studio Domestic Goddess είναι η καταλληλότερη συλλογή για φθινοπωρινά projects! Αυτή και χρησιμοποίησα!  Επίσης έβαλα και αυτές τις

υπέροχες σφραγίδες, που θα βρείτε στο κατάστημα ScrapsNPieces!

Να και το πανέμορφο moodboard της Βάλιας Κατζάκη για το ScrapsNPieces 

από το οποίο εμπνεύστηκα (κάπου έχω κρυμμένο ένα φύλλο maple - όποια το βρει, κερδίζει, επίσης βασίστηκα στη μεσαία δεξιά φωτό με το μπουκέτο για το cluster μου)

Tα χρώματα τα πήρα από το χρωματικό συνδυασμό του Words & Paintery

Αυτά τα ολίγα!  Λοιπόν έχετε προθεσμία να μας δείξετε τα φθινοπωρινά εργα σας έως τις 26 Νοεμβρίου!

Φιλιά πολλά!

Leaves are the butterflies of Fall

Καλημέρα!

Σήμερα είναι η μέρα του 7 Dots Studio.  Έφτιαξα μια φθινοπωρινή σελίδα με κεντρικό θέμα τα φύλλα του δάσους ή γενικότερα, το έδαφος ενός δάσους το φθινόπωρο.

Μου αρέσει πολύ το φθινόπωρο, είναι ο προάγγελος του χειμώνα... όλα ετοιμάζονται να ησυχάσουν, να ηρεμήσουν και να κλειστούν στις φωλιές τους. Από τα λίγα πράγματα που πετούν είναι τα κόκκινα, πορτοκαλί, κίτρινα φύλλα που παίρνει ο άνεμος στο διάβα του και τα εναποθέτει στο έδαφος σε στοιβάδες, μαζί με άλλα στοιχεία του δάσους.  Μου μοιάζουν σαν πεταλούδες.  Έχοντας όλα αυτά στη σκέψη μου έφτιαξα το παρακάτω layout:

Products used:

Domestic Goddess - Collage Fashionista

Domestic Goddess - Stickers 6x12

UWS - Yuletide - Words Stencil

H τέλεια σειρά του 7 Dots για φθινοπωρινά projects είναι η Domestic Goddess. Δεν έχω κάτι άλλο να προσθέσω, τα χρώματα της τα λένε όλα!

Λέω να την ανεβάσω στο Scrapki-wyzwaniowo, 

το θέμα του οποίου για τον Οκτώβριο είναι το φθινόπωρο (bingo)!

Καθώς και στο Berry71Bleu

(εδώ έχουμε φύλλα σε στοιβάδες, ακριβώς ό,τι έχω κάνει κι εγώ)

Αυτά από μένα!  Ελπίζω να σας αρέσει η σελίδα μου (εγώ τη βρίσκω κάπως υπερβολικά messy and mixed-media)!

Love is

Hello hello!

Here I am today to share with you my guest-designer's page for Fairy's Challenge, based on a lovely sketch by Ira Rulya!  I loved loved loved the sketch, so my page is all about love.  Love is to share your ice-cream and everything you like/fancy/hold dear with the ones you love.

13 Arts Mental Vacation by Jelissa Mei

The sketch that inspired my is this

as well as this Фабрики Декора October Moodboard

I'm also going to submit my page to the Crafty Life October Challenge, whose theme this month is "Anything goes". So I think that LOVE goes, don't you agree?  Crafty Life is a newbie in the scrapchallenge-sphere and its Design Team is super-talented and inspirational, so I thought to join them this month!

That's everything from me!

Off to work now! Thanks for visiting my blog!

Important - a layout video tutorial for 7 Dots Studio

Good morning everyone!

September is leaving us soon and we are heading well into autumn (even though the weather here doesn't look like autumnal a lot)... I always feel a bit of relief when October comes, as my favourite season - winter - is close. So being in a good mood today I want to share with you my 5th video tutorial for 7 Dots Studio!

Finnabair's Mica Powders, a bit of mists, a couple of flowers & embellishments do the work! 

I used the amazing "Lost & Found" Collection!  

The elegant, fragile, touching music belongs to the OST of the "The Theory of Everything" movie (The Cinematic Orchestra - the arrival of the birds & Transformation)!  I love it and I thought it fitted my video perfectly, stylewise.  

The theme of my page is something really important, that we women tend to forget: we don't have to be picture perfect!

Now this is the page

(closer details of my layout you can find at this 7 Dots Studio blogpost)

7 Dots Studio Products used: 

Lost & Found - Lab Notes; Lost & Found - Clear Stamps; Lost & Found - Die-Cut Elements 6x12; Lost & Found - Tags 12x12; Lost & Found - Word Stickers 6x12; 

UWS - Handwriting stencil

And my video tutorial, which I hope will help and inspire you

At this point I would like to say that, in the midst of the political turmoil that my homeland Greece has found herself into the last years and especially the last 6 months,  I have lost my mojo and inspiration many times.  And I have tried to draw inspiration from moodboards, challenge blogs, beautiful Pinterest photos, etc.  

This time my inspiration came from this lovely, vintage

Scrap Around the World moodboard by Lydie Denis

I got inspired by the vintage, delicate, elegant style, the earthy tones that are complimented by touches of pink, that I also used in my page. My choice for the background paper and handwriting stencil stemmed from the down middle photo, as well as the small roses came from the down left one.

So I hope you enjoy my video!  If there's anything you would like to ask me concerning it, please don't hesitate to!

Generation to generation

Good morning everyone!
Today I would like to share with you a page that I made for the Lindy's Stamp Gang September Color Challenge.  I had quite some time to get messy with inks just for the fun of a challenge, so a couple of days ago, I saw the current LSG prompt and thought "wow, these are so vibrant and solid colours - what a task to combine them all together".  I usually am not the kind of person who takes big risks, I like to play safe but this time it was too provoking to ignore it.  Therefore I took some LSG mists, a nice dramatic and bold 7 Dots Studio paper and took the risk to combine all these beautiful colours together.

Before I show you my page, take a look at the colour combo

 

Pretty bold, eh?

So I went for a hugely dramatic page

(I think my next page will be made on a white background lol)

  

7 Dots Studio - Dreamer - Night's fever

Now the LSG mists I used are the following:

Creme brulee Cream

Don't eat golden snow

Golden sleigh bells

Cape Cod coral

Steampunk Sepia

Rusty Lantern Lime

Rudolph's Nose Red

Frolic in the Forest black

So a few words on how I built my page:

In order to tackle the issue of having too many vibrant colours together in one combination, I took advantage of my 7 Dots Paper, which had them already placed like a rainbow, first the cold hues with the warm following them.  So I followed the same pattern with my embellies, just to achieve chromatic balance (you know how important this is for me) while maintaining the bold and strong character of my page. Some stamping here and there, a few bits'n'pieces and fibres/treads/strings.

Simple, isn't it? I don't know if my attempt to play with so many colours, I am satisfied that I tried it, though.

So I hope you like it!  I will come back soon with a video tutorial for 7 Dots Studio!

Have an awesome day!

Drop every fear

Hello hello!

Do you like adventure? Do you like forests? Well if you do, the Berry71Bleu September challenge is the right thing for you!  Tusia Lech is the author of the challenge, the moodboard of which is simply stunning!  I had the honour to be a guest designer for this challenge and I thank the Berry71Bleu blog for the invitation!

This is what I created

I used the fabulous 7 Dots Studio Lost & Found Collection

I have always been enchanted by forests.  For some reason, they meant the start of an adventure for me.  And they always contained some magic in them.  Having this notion in mind, I picked a photo that depicts a misty, kinda spooky forest which lies by the end of a river or lake.  There's some haze, there's some fog... all these make it look as it's beckoning at me to enter.  

So that's everything from me!  I hope I relayed these impressions of mine to you with my page and I inspire you to share your view on forests with a scrapbooking project!   

Have a nice day!