adventure with a go-to

I wanted to get a card made for Merry Monday.  I love Leslies' sketches, this one is no exception:

As soon as I chose a piece of Snow Festival designer series paper for the vertical rectangle, I thought of that cute little snowball-rolling bird in the Snow Much Fun set for the star element.  That cute little bird seems to pop into my mind a lot, it made me think this stamp set may be a go-to set for me.

stamp set - Snow Much Fun; ink - Baja Breeze, Not Quite Navy; Stampin' Write markers - Basic Black, Baja Breeze, More Mustard, Not Quite Navy; card stock - Baja Breeze, Not Quite Navy, Whisper White; designer series paper - Snow Festival; Big Shot with Perfect Polka Dots textured embossing folder; Stampin' Dimensionals, stampin' sponge

The Perfect Polka Dots textured embossing folder is another go-to; it always comes to mind for snow and it also works for baby cards, kids' cards, masculine and feminine designs.  I love all my textured embossing folders but if I had to choose one, it might be this one.  Speaking of texture, I don't know if you can see the snowflakes on the sentiment strip, but they're from an old texture plate I originally bought for polymer clay.  I embossed that piece of card stock years ago, when I first got my Big Shot (unquestionably a go-to tool), and saved the scrap.  I knew it would be perfect for something someday!
 
I've not done as well with the Christmas-cards-all-year project as I did last year.  I've been wondering why - there are lots of possible "reasons" (ok, yes, excuses is really the right word) - I have more favorite challenges this year (last year I only knew about one), I didn't like the cards I made early this year and felt a little discouraged, the newness of creating for challenges and blogging have worn off...the only reason that really "sticks" for me is that I'm just lazy, but I don't want to admit to that one.