I made this wonderful little circus train elephant for the "A Vintage Journey' challenge - to use texture.
The elephant started out as a small papermache elephant that I purchased at Michaels a year or so ago (wish I had bought more of them!!) I covered him with lots of small irregular shaped pieces of foil tape. I adhered the pieces over the entire elephant - overlapping the edges and smoothing the pieces with a paper nib as I went along. Then I made the 'rivets' by pushing the point of a pushpin and the end of a metal tip ball point pen (the kind you click open and closed) around all the edges of the foil tape. It's a technique I learned when I took a class run by THE Tim Holtz himself! Next I sponged over the entire elephant with Pitch Black, Stonewashed and Butterscotch Adirondack Alcohol Inks. Then you sand most of the ink off with a piece of steel wool. I colored a metal crown and wings using alcohol inks and adhered them to the elephant with large glue dots. I also added a tail that you cannot see in this pic.
I cut the box from Black Little Sizzles Matboard with the Blocks/Cubes Sizzix Die using the largest block. I covered the panels with paper from Paper Stash 8x8 Collage, sponging the edges of the box and papers with Vintage Photo Distress Ink.