Hello...?

Hey!

Hello? Is anyone there? Well after a near two-month blogging break I'm wondering if anyone might actually be visiting by here anymore! To anyone who is reading this, welcome! It's been a while and a lot has happened in the meantime (more on that later though!) but the main thing is that I'm B.A.C.K. :D

It certainly feels fabulous to be back blogging and I'm going to be sticking around over the next few days with some serious enabling of the new Clearly Besotted February release!

Oh it's felt so good to get back on the CB bandwagon and get busy with these amazing goodies. The release is available to purchase from 5th February 10pm (UK time) and there's something for everyone! From cute to contemporary, CB has it covered. :)

I thought it might be tough to get back into the cardmaking habit for the blogeroo after so long away, but when you have yummy products to work with it certainly kicks the mojo into gear. Today's card features stunning images and a sentiment from the new set, Sketched Blooms. I fell for this set instantly. The beautiful, detailed images. The wonderful font used for the sentiments. I think it's fair to say it's a favourite!

• The leaves appear behind the flower thanks to a simple masking technique. I always keep any masks I make for future projects too.
• Distress Inks were used to colour my images by tapping them onto my acrylic block, misting them with water and using them as watercolours.
• I placed the mask back onto the flower before adding some green Distress Ink splatter to protect the pink bloom. 

Well I'm sure you probably came here from Stephanie who is sharing a list of everyone joining in the release fun including our fabulous guest designers, Lucy Abrams, Jo Nevill & Jen Nelson! But if you haven't, then do pop across as there's plenty more enabling to be done!

***Warning! Plenty of non-crafty pictures ahead! Please feel free to hop along!***

As for me, I mentioned that a lot had happened in my near two-month blogging break. Christmas came and went and I've been creating a lot for publications that I can't really share here yet. But most importantly, I gained a husband, changed my name and had the best day ever. Our wedding day! Yup, I'm now Amy Gray and I'll be updating things with my new name in time. I could seriously bore you all day week month about our wedding but I won't. I'll just leave you with some pics from the talented Jo & Simon from Shoot Lifestyle Photography:

We kept things non-traditional and both got ready at home. I loved how casual the morning was - not a single nerve was felt by this bride!

I love that we have pictures to treasure of our home. We're lucky to live in a hall from the 1600s and seeing as we're looking to move soon, we wanted to make our home a big part of our day.

I debated on paper flowers for my bouquet (after all, I am a papercrafter with hay fever!) but I'm so happy that I opted for real flowers. I had pussy willow in my bouquet as a tribute to my dear dad who passed away two years ago. I think he would have loved the fact that it complemented my faux fur coat too. A happy coincidence.

I couldn't get my craft on half as much as I would have liked to but I did love creating our cake topper thanks to a Lia Griffith template to use with my Cricut Explore. :)

We had every weather going that day. Snow, rain, hail and fortunately some winter sunshine - just in time for the photography! :)

We were married at Chatsworth which is beautiful in itself, but at the same time sentimental to me. It's where I spent many summers growing up, jumping in the river from a rope swing (which you'd never catch me doing now!)

Though you can catch me jumping on a horse for a photo opportunity! It was much easier getting up there than it was getting down...

I'm pretty sure that's enough for you but just in case it's not (Ha! Who am I kidding?!), the extremely talented and lovely Jo and Simon from Shoot Lifestyle Photography have shared more pictures here. We can't thank them enough for the precious moments they captured.  Oh and the miracles they can work with a camera too! :)

And if you're still with me after all of that, thank you so much for your patience with my blogging break and for stopping by today. I'll be back tomorrow with another CB sneaky peek!