Violet sky

Yesterday the sky turned violet, it was absolutely beautiful :-)
Ghost lollipops, they are so cute!

xoxo
Aleka

Tuesday's pick:SleepyRobot13

Hello!
Yesterday was a national holiday so the day was spent with our nephew drawing Godzilla and Transformers. So I wandered if I had any robots in my favorites, after a quick search tadaa: SleepyRobot13. A unique little shop with the most adorable robots from polymer clay! Some of my favorites:

 Sleepy robot

 Robot in a panda costume

Where the wild thing are - Max robot

 Super hero robot

 Robot and white kitty

You can read more about Lisastarchild and follow her facebook page for more cool robots :-)

Have a lovely day, 

Aleka

Halloween houses

Last Halloween craft and it's an easy one :-)
I used this house pattern, transferred it to black and white paper using carbon, it doesn't show on the black paper but on the white it's pretty visible. So I had my nephew paint over the blue lines with a black marker and gave him a silver marker to paint the black houses. I think it's easier for a kid to paint on the paper when it's flat, after he painted them I used glue on the flaps and mini wooden pegs to hold them while the glue dried.

While I waited I made a super quick mini bat garland, just cut bat shapes and little triangles from black paper, add a dab of glue on the back side and glue them on jute string. I used scotch tape to stick it on the wall behind my houses but if you have washi tape with a Halloween pattern that will look great!

The fun thing about these houses is that their tops are not glued so you can lift them and use the inside of the house to keep candy or spooky decorations :-)

xoxo
Aleka

Linked to Homework, Lizmarieblog & Whipperberry

Tuesday's pick: Ucuspucus

Hello there!
This Tuesday's pick is etsy shop Ucuspucus, a shop filled with beauty and cuteness. The woman behind the art is Raluca, a doctor by profession and creator of wonderful watercolor art on her free time. Some of my favorites:

Figs original watercolor art

Seaside city landscape print

Basil branches in a jar original art

Cupcake & hedgehog print

Mauve tulips print

Find more about Raluca by visiting her blog and her Facebook page!

xoxo

Aleka

Trick or treat bags

I love working with paper so here's a tutorial for making monster and pumpkin trick or treat bags!

You'll need pva glue, two balloons and pieces of newspaper. You can either pick the balloon with the size you want and blow it up completely or just use the ones you have (I had big size balloons) and just blow it up to the size you want. Start gluing the paper on, cover the entire surface of the balloon leaving enough space at the bottom for your hand to go through. Let each layer dry before applying the next one, four or five layers of paper make a very sturdy bag. Once you have applied the final layer and it is dry pop the balloon, then cut the edge of your bag so that it's even. Apply gesso to the inside and outside before you apply paint. Paint it like a pumpkin or green monster. Make two holes at the side and tie your cord and you're done! My nephew loved the green monster, when he saw it he said "brains, brains" :-)

Tips:
Start with a layer of white wrapping paper (I have a lot of it from Ikea, the one you wrap glass and breakables) that way you won't have to paint the inside. You can also end with a layer of the same paper so won't have to gesso the outside before you paint it.
After you have done all the layers and popped the balloon hold the bag up to the light, that way you'll see the parts that aren't so thick, that's where you'll need to add paper to make them stronger.
Or you can alternate layers between newspaper and wrapping paper so it will be easier to see which parts you've missed.

Hope you like it :-)
Aleka

Linked to Whipperberry and LizMarieblog!

Tuesday's pick: L'Accent Nou

Hello!
October has been a very sunny month so far but somehow I'm in a winter mood! I can't really explain why I'm drawn to darker images and more moody photos. My pick for this Tuesday is a beautiful shop called L'Accent Nou run by Anastasia. She creates jewelry and decor items from clay & pebbles, and also has photos and cards from her unique illustrations. Some of my favorites:

 Crying bird bowl

 Pebble ring

 Mini bowl

 I love you card

Tibet necklace

You can find more about Anastasia and her work in her blog and facebook page!

xoxo
Aleka

Catching up

We were away for the weekend so I spent most of last week trying to finish things so I won't have to play catch up this week :-)
My uncle's dog sleeping, she was having very vivid dreams! And a really huge praying mantis at our window, thought it's much colder at our village there is a lot of bug activity going on, wasps, crickets and all sorts of bugs were around.

Wishing you a lovely week,

Aleka

Tuesday's Pick: Kari Herer

Hi there!
This Tuesday I bring you one of my favorite photographers, KariHerer! I love the colors on her still life compositions, the combination of magnolia flower petals and illustrations, the use of antlers with flowers, her minimal black and white photos. Some of my favorites:

 Flower photograph No.88237

 Magnolia bug No.4334

Botanical No.7004

Magnolia and flower illustration No.6688

  Botanical black & white

You can find a lot more at her site (I am a dog person, I admit it and that is the cutest dog ever!), her blog and her facebook page!

Wishing you a great day,
Aleka

Felt bones

Halloween is a holiday we don't have in Greece, there is a similar holiday called "Apokries" where people dress up but it's not really linked to witches, monsters and scary things. So I've learned to love Halloween from movies, one of my favorites is Tim Burton's "Nightmare before Christmas" and this absolutely fantastic song!
So here's a super easy tutorial for making felt bones. I've used grey and black felt and after cutting out the shapes I stitched them together with matching thread colors and stuffed them with polyfill batting. You can use the last image as a guide for the shapes, the three bone shapes fit an A4 page. Just right click and save the image.
You can make lots and lots of them to have as decorations for Halloween :-)
Have a lovely weekend,
Aleka

Tuesday's pick: Ewa Lompe

Hi all!!
October is here and I'm officially ending my break :-)
So I'll begin again the Tuesday's pick series featuring some my favorite shops on Etsy. And for this week I picked a very unique jewelry maker from Poland: EwaLompe. I love the texture and materials of her creations, they fit so perfectly with autumn beginning don't they :-)
Some of my favorites:

 Ring of the soul

 Baltic amber bracelet

 Little leaves earrings

Bicycle brooch

Can ring

You can see more of her work on her Facebook page and of course her Etsy shop!

Wishing you a great October 1st and happy autumn :-)
Aleka