Love is an a c t i o n of Faith

quote by Erich Fromm, The art of Loving 1956

For a  h a p p y   S u n d a y  post,

pictures of a spontaneous table styling put together some time in August last year

to submit to Ikea Family Live Magazine...

{ find the post  h e r e }

... I had returned from a few "girlfriend" days

spent together with Ilaria at her Happy House in Eindohoven, The Netherlands...

Having recently met her again while currently residing in Amsterdam,

and while organizing and thoroughly cleaning my laptop files

I stumbled upon them

&

thought it'd be nice to bring these pictures here to share with you,

changing the fact they had never been posted, that is till now...

So, there you go!

... a little inspiration in  b a b y   b l u e   +   b l a c k 

a rather sweet + powerful combination,

built around the central pieces of two mini  s u c c u l e n t   p l a n t s...

two mini succulent plants

picked up from a flower shop at Venlo station where I changed trains,

on my way home by the woods close to Frankfurt last year,

They each required  99 cents for their purchase.

 Being mighty prettily wrapped in

silver & powder pink foils with the company's logo

- which I apologize that my current brain capacity cannot withdraw  -

they were so totally worth it, I had to ask whether there was a mistake

made.

"No, of course not" the kind sales assistant replied

to my inquiry,

smiling then at my surprise...

"Are they for a present?"she asked.

"Yes, please. They are for our home"

I replied, my face beaming with radiance...

When on board the next train to my final destination and while holding them,

all I could think of was various ways of incorporating them

in the work I was at the time preparing for the I. F. L magazine...

I remembered about the paper plates + cups set in baby blue

I had scored for about another euro

in a recent Ikea visit,

as much as the mini napkins in black

I threw in my shopping cart

with a certainty that they would eventually be properly used.

So they were.

Wrapped around the succulents and secured with black & white bakers' twine.

A silver marker came to leave

wishes and names beautifully handwritten on them,

emphasizing the d e p t h  of black,

while  b r i d g i n g  it to the softness of baby blue.

More silver tones were added by the wire

which was transformed into handles for the

glass candle holders originating 

from little sweet jars...

hope you are even a little inspired to put together your own pretty table settings,

keeping in mind that  i n e x p e n s i v e   m a t e r i a l s  and  s i m p l i c i t y  can very often

be best friends to an outcome speaking of  e l e g a n c e ,  r i c h n e s s,  w e a l t h 

& 

t r u e   l o v e  for essentially g o o d   l i f e .

Let's drink to that, shall we?

to a great end to this weekend + a powerful start in the new week!

Thank you for reading & au revoir , xo

planting happiness ~

 am wondering whether getting away with just few words is possible...

 knowing that lots of you here appreciate my communicative nature,

it seems hard to be coming here to make "simple" posts and go...

 still, it will have to be the case for some future posts,

 cause there is so much of my time & energy directed

 in designing our new living space to be,

 that I feel the need to come and post here

 sometimes saying few words if any...

 I would just not like that you feel that I'm cheating on you...

 in the meantime, I start getting prepared to be sharing some facts about the new home

little by little

so, this simple collage put together above,

is a little story on its own.

... these baby aloe vera plants, are not just any aloe plants

but the "children"of very productive parents,

or else the first aloe plant I bought for the second apartment,

that I was renting on my own back in 2004 - 2006 in Greece

in the meantime, they adjusted wonderfully in my parents' new apartment

{aka apart44} in such {white super functional & pretty pots},

while endlessly growing an expanding.

now let's hope that these baby immigrants will adjust to the German climate ; )

on another notice,

how would you like popping by Ikea Family Live's site,

and reading the latest post I prepared?

I'm so happy to be sharing my thoughts with you

through blogging posts there, too!

today it's all about

"Enjoying your home"

 and then unless you have already done so,

 wonderful Holly from decor8 has written

one fabulous post on

 "Authentic Interiors" and was so kind into including 

our current home as an example

with these pictures...

am beyond honored and happy ...

hope your days were nice 

&

 your weekend will be an even nicer one!

kind regards you all ~

pop by and say hello when you can, would you?

xx

~ the Penthouse @ Ikea Family Live magazine

hello everyone!

 isn't it quite a nice date today, that is if a detail like that matters to you at all in any way?

 09.09.2011

 numbers have a symbolic meaning to me

 and am quite a fan of them,

 asides from having been quite good at dealing with them back at school and university

 it seems to be connected with an easiness in evaluating spaces,

 visualising complete rooms put together

 {without even having made one sketch by hand or on the pc}

 make the best possible use of their space, 

 maximising their performance with simple & easy solutions

I guess this characteristic allows me to be successful as 

an interiors consultant & designer

speaking of that, I'm quite happy to be sharing today with you,

after a week that the edition has arrived in our mailbox,

{I just wanted that a few very dear friends had the honour of finding out in person by me,

before making a post here & I just loved their reaction and input!}

that our current home,

this so beloved & charming, little {loft Penthouse} of ours,

is hosted in the German Fall issue of Ikea Family Live

it is a wonderful feeling being hosted in the pages of a publication I adore,

which has also marked the beginning of my life in Germany,

the magazine being something totally new to me back then{3 years ago},

as it wasn't published in Greek.

and the best of all, it is connected to a company I love!

having not the time to momentarily translate the interview into English for you,

I'll just state a few facts:

 1.  the interview took place on the phone

and the Penthouse is mentioned as my current residence,

which I share with my life partner.

 2. I'm also mentioned as their co worker, as since a year now,

I'm blogging for their online website,

which by the way since yesterday has launched totally new!

you may check it out {here}

& visit me {there}

3.  Ikea Family Live's editors have contacted me twice more than a year ago, asking if I would be interested in having their stylists and photography crew come over for a

detailed feature in their magazine

 4. I was "dying" to meet the crew and see how they work on the spot

 5.  what went wrong? 

my life partner didn't wish to be part of this

& 

we were trying to arrange how he would be away for the three days that the crew would be here

  6. I clearly decided that him and our relationship is more important than my wish

to have our home published in a magazine and a favorite team work

 7. in the meantime he is {through living together with somebody who blogs}

much more relaxed about such issues,

so perhaps a new home in the future could be a potential feature 

 8. I was thrilled when the editors suggested that we make a small feature instead,

me sending my own pictures as an interiors photographer

and voila:

so it happened!

isn't life the most fabulous adventure my dear all?

and aren't true love & patience always rewarded?

it seems so....

anyway, I'll have to leave you with some of my portfolio's favorite pictures

 which were used for thefeature:

our living / lounge / sofa area

our reading corner, as seen from the kitchen with a view to the stairs up

my favorite box carrying always my latest paper creations {like these ones}

our reading corner's art wall,

the creation of which you may follow in two parts

as blogged for Ikea Family's live website

{here} + {here}

and a quick, tasty solution for a Sunday breakfast as blogged {here} about a year ago

below are the scanned pages of the magazine

and promise as soon as I take some time off during the weekend

to catch up with... myself amongst all craziness,

I'll post the translation cause it has some humourous parts, too!

wishing everyone the happiest of Friday & weekends ahead!

see you soon my dears ~

Love,

Iro - Ivy

 ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~

photography & interior styling by Iro Ivy Nassopoulos for Domestic stories with Ivy 2011 & Ikea Family Live {all rights reserved}

~ recovering stress relief...

....what an adventure with Blogger these past days!

...ok compared to the happenings here in Greece, it is a tiny little spot in a huge map 

of difficulties...so, the fact that a blog post disappeared from the drafts and published section of Domestic stories  is certainly not a big deal.

How are you all?...I'm really sorry that some of the lovely comments you had left have also vanished.

But do know that I had read them and they made me smile, as they always do.

Thank you :)

I'm reposting here the pictures of the delicious chocolate souffle I'm so often mentioning about happily baking.

All the recipe's ingredients and instructions can be found right {here},

as blogged for the online magazine of Ikea Fanily Live.

In the meantime, take a look at the pictures below 

&

 come meet me at the end of the post for some more news ;)

...as you saw there are just a few basic ingredients

and making it is a very simple, enjoyable and actually quite relaxing process.

...almost as stress relieving as:

~ sitting by the beach, 

~ relaxing with your favorite book 

or

~ practising yoga perhaps...

...when you get to trying the recipe out, I'd love to find out how it went!

 ...seeing pictures would also be great, 

so how about linking me to them or sending them by mail?

...am loooking forward!

...and below I have a little "behind the scenes" picture of the photo shoot back in February.

...I think it communicates well, how much every little bit of the whole process was enjoyed.

...you possibly already know that I love to pay attention to details...

enjoying the moment...

being fully present in whatever I engage into, 

so that this little bit of magic is there...

...btw, have you all had a nice time during the weekend?

Mine was filled with precious time spent with friends,

 but it was also a rather busy one, despite the fact that I came here for vacation.

{ I think I can soon forget about that!}

I've been making paper boat garlands & have them already available at the shop 

right {here}

You can take a sneak peek until I bring them here and present them to you!

....would really love to stay longer here, 

writing and sharing pictures, like the one below from the Art exhibition I visited on Friday, 

via

but I need to wake up early in the morning and work, helping a friend, who is also supporting me.

Difficult times have such cases...

one is helping the other...

and that is a good thing :)

~ have a super wonderful start in the new week

& see you soon ~