It should come as no surprise that I love poodles:
Both the in the fur variety, like my darling Mr. Tuvok, and the collectible 1950's variety as seen on the purse.
The 1950's might not have been the golden age of everything, but they where definitely the golden age of the poodle. Poodles where everywhere. In advertisements,
on skirts, sweaters,
knick knacks, purses, book ends, mirrors, lamps
even toilet seat covers!.
There is a whole book devoted to the mid century poodle collecting obsession. I've never read it but you can buy it used on Amazon.
Maybe there not everyone's cup of tea, but to me these delightfully kitschy 1950s and 60s poodle images just put modern dog graphics to shame.
So ubiquitous was the mid century poodle that I was actually shocked to learn that according to the AKC poodles where only the decade's 7th most popular breed. Regardless of the ranking, the poodle and the 1950s are forever linked.
Sadly today, I feel the poodle has fallen a bit out of favor. Doodles are popular but poodles don't seem to get the same respect they used too.
I am also troubled by the modern trend to groom a poodle into looking like some other breed of dog. I have written before about how I want Mr. Tuvok to be groomed in a traditional pet poodle style, and that can be a challenge. Groomers have told me that most people tell them to make their dogs look less like a poodle. A sentiment that really kind of angers me, poodles are a wonderful breed, why would you want to disguise that? Smart, companionable, athletic affectionate, and in a range of sizes, they really are fantastic. Let's have some poodle pride!
With my love for dogs and vintage I can't get enough of dog themed vintage clothing, so when I saw that my favorite novelty skirt designer, Girl In A Whirl, was adding 1950's Mexican style tourist jackets to her wares I knew I wanted where my poodle pride on my sleeve with a poodle themed jacket. I messaged Girl In A Whirl designer, Rebecca and told her I was dreaming of a jacket with little black poodles on it. I wanted the poodles to have the classic well groomed 1950's look and to be wearing red berets. Rebecca understood exactly what I meant and my new Girl In A Whirl jacket is perfect!
I've been wearing it at least once a week since I got it and I never get tired of it (and yes Mr. Tuvok has a red beret, it was actually part of his pug sister Ping's halloween costume a few years ago.)
The picture's here are from two different occasions. First I am wearing the jacet with Freddies of Pinewood jeans and a striped top. The second time with with my Marie Guye western jumpsuit. Both time's I wore my red Chatterblossom hair flower and of course my poodle purse.
I also added gold tone poodle scatter pins to the neck of the jacket. I have had these forever and I forget where I got them but they only cost a couple of bucks and they are perfectly at home on the jacket. Proof that it always pays to take advantage of a vintage deal even if your not totally sure what to do with the item.
Because Rebecca is so talented the details of jacket are incredible.
The front of the jacket has red whip stitching and the poodles are wearing red bow ties to match their berets.
The pocket's have red whip stitching and pom pom trim
There is even a little K on the collar!
So the front is perfect, but the back is even better. The poodles on the back are playing with a red and blue ball.
They have little sparkly blue eyes and light blue bows, as well as berets:
I really think they look just like Mr. Tuvok!
Even the red ball is carefully stitched with blue ribbon to match the poodle neck bows.
I'm just so happy to have this jacket in my collection and so grateful to Girl In A Whirl for making it for me. I know Ill be enjoying it, along with all other things poodle, for years to come.
It's taking me a while to get around to writing this post, and not because I don't love the products I'm reviewing but just due to be being busy. I ordered 3 bandanas from Electrolucy back in September for Fry's second birthday.
I found the shop while doing a search for two of my favorite things on etsy Star Trek and dogs. Electrolucy makes awesome geeky dog bandannas and collars with themes such as Harry Potter, Dr. Who, Star Wars, Sherlock Holmes and of course, Star Trek. I ordered three Star Trek themed bandannas.
A Star Trek Dr. McCoy themed bandanna:
A Star Trek The Next Generation Wesley Crusher Bandanna:
A tribble themed bandanna:
The bandannas are all made of nice sturdy double sided fabric, with the design and wording stitched on. and a tie around the neck,. I really like the neck ties as I find them quicker and easier to take on and off then bandannas that slide over a collar. Each bandanna comes in sizes small, medium, and large and retails for ten to 14 dollars, depending on size. I ordered smalls and found them to be generously sized for the pugs, and perhaps a smidge to large on Tuvok.
These bandannas are too cute and I definitely recommend checking out Electrolucy.
This weekend we met Santa!
Sadly he didn't arrive in a cool 1950s car. He was at the Staten Island Pet Smart.
First we visited Grandpa in Bay Ridge
We didn't bring Bob because we know he is not too crazy about his Uncle Rocco, not pictured, a puggle. After visiting Grandpa we drove through Staten Island to see the big guy, sadly the NJ pet smart has stopped having a live Santa and our local pet store that used to do photos closed. So Pet Smart it was, and it was packed! The line wrapped around the store and I was reminded of my favorite Christmas Story, Santa Land Diaries by David Sedaris, if you haven't read or listened to it you must! Here is the link to the transcript and recording.
Anyway, I was relived we hadn't brought Bob because he would never have tolerated the line and there was a huge pet adoption event too, I was glad about that because we where able to make a donation. The line was filled with cute dogs so it was fun.
My favorite was a tiny chihuahua puppy, you can barely see him on his mom's shoulder here:
I got to hold him and should have taken a photo then but I was seriously overwhelmed! He was so tiny and cute. He weighed 1.5 lbs and was 14 weeks old. He made Tuvok look huge. His mom said he should get to be between 3.5 and 4 lbs fully grown which is a healthy weight for a chihuahua, I've done research. Why anyone on Earth would want an even smaller dog is beyond me but they do! Someday I will have a chihuahua from a reputable Chihuahua club of America breeder.
Anyway we finally reached the end of the line and there was Santa. Santa was very nice but the photo elf was kind of rude.
The pictures I too with my phone where better then the pet smart digital downloads and they didn't even give you a print out! That really dissapointed me because I have all the old Santa photos with our past pets displayed in the house. Here is a photo of our rescue pug Bingo form eight years ago. We adopted him after moving to NJ. He had cancer and was incontinent and had to use a stroller but he lived almost two years! He was such a sweet old guy.
I really wanted to be able to display Santa photos of Weasley Fry and Tuvok on our mantle along with our old dogs. Oh well.
Happy Holidays!
Living in the city as we do holiday markets are a big thing. We used to go into Manhattan to the Union Square Holiday Market, but now there is no need too. As legions of New Yorkers have been priced out of Manhattan and the boroughs, they have crossed the river to NJ and Jersey City, where we live, is becoming the 6th borough. This has meant a glut of new restaurants and stores and events. One cool new thing is Project Market, a bi-monthly outdoor market with food vendors and artists.
This past weekend Project Market had their biggest market of the year, the Holiday market. We biked down town with Fry in his basket to check it out. Fry is currently our best bicycling dog and I really should have gotten a picture of him on the bike. (Incidentally we have been seriously considering going car free which would mean investing in some different pet bike trailers for the other dogs. We rarely drive and I love the idea of being car free, except for occasional rentals, if we can figure out how to manage it. Luckily we are two blocks from our vet. Not only is biking it better for the environment, it saves money, and is great exercises. My husband is really passionate about biking.)
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Fry after his bike ride.
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The market was pretty big and Fry was maybe a little overwhelmed.
We tried S'mores hot chocolate with a gingersnap cookie rim and fried Wisconsin cheese curds. I didn't get a picture of the curds but they were delicious.
There were tons of stands, more then I could photograph:
My favorite stand was unsurprisingly, the vintage one. They had a cute collection of vintage valentine cards:
and some fun poodle things, I bought the 1950s poodle book ends.
The one thing the market was missing was dog treats! I was pretty disapointed. We made it up to Fry by giving him part of a donut from the Italian bakery, so he was happy.
All in all we had a great time at the market, and I love my new book ends.
