"Die Herren Pudels"

"Die Herren Pudels" is not correct German if you wonder (it ought to be "Pudel"), it's an affectionate nickname for my favorite poodles. You could translate it as "The Misters Poodles" (staying in line with the wrong grammar), but they would probably prefer the translation "The Masters Poodles" because masters they are - Kosimo and Nemo Black Power vom Glashütter Täle.
Their humans have helped me out more than once, and as I had still one of my small bottles standing around, I thought I'd bead a poodle bottle for them as a little thank you.

I looked at poodle drawings and silhouettes online to get a feeling for the outlines and then made my own pattern of Kosel and Nemo looking at one another. So far so good.
As they are white despite their name (more on that later), I wanted a dark background. I hadn't thought it through completely when I chose gunmetal for it, though, which I noticed when I came to their black noses. I was not prepared to rip up rows and rows of beads. In the right light you can see the noses, but they don't look quite as pointy as they would have with a better contrast which actually works quite well. Lucky me.
It didn't work as well for the collars. The heads kind of looked as if they were floating, so I actually had to rip out those few rows again. I went for slimmer collars in a dark red instead.

No fancy fashion poodle haircuts on these two!

On the back I added a few hearts and a few silver beads.

If you have seen my other beaded bottles, you may have noticed a difference between them and this one.
Usually the beading goes all the way up over the shoulder and neck. I start on the pattern to make sure I position it right - some patterns are a full image which means I have background rows at the bottom or they show just a part of something like here where the poodles go all the way to the bottom - then I do the shoulder and neck and after that I finish the bottom which is never fully closed, by the way.
The bottles I have made so far are never meant to hold any liquid but mostly as decoration although I can put needles in them for example or something else that fits through the neck.

In this case, however, I thought it would be a cute little vase for a single blossom or also a few, such as daisies (as a kid, I liked to bring my mom tiny daisy "bouquets"). The poodle humans love plants.
So I stopped beading at the shoulder which means it's like one of those cooling sleeves now, you can just pull the bottle out if you need to clean it. I actually like the idea.

I felt that the beading needed a nice edge now, though.
Pink crystals were the natural choice because Kosel is 1. the sparkle master with his rhinestone on black collar (Nemo has white Swiss crosses on black) and 2. he loves pink. I have a pair of pink slippers standing in the hallway and he has stolen one of them more than once.

There was just one problem. I couldn't do a symmetrical edge because I have a prime number of beads. So instead it became an asymmetrical "crown" which fits the noble lineage of the masters 😉

Now the promised explanation for the name.
I have often wondered why some animals have such crazy names (cats are an exception, they deserve the most wonderful and craziest names there are), like horses or purebred dogs, and I don't want to miss out on the chance to tell you the names of Kosel's and Nemo's parents (with their humans' permission).
Kosel's father is named Decathlon Alfredo Magdalena, his mother Iska Black Power vom Glashütter Täle.
Nemo's father is Begin to Dream Love me Tender (a beautiful French poodle also called Merlin) and his mother is Kosel's sister Kosima Black Power vom Glashütter Täle.
The lady Kosel and Nemo came from actually used to have black poodles and then fell in love with the dark eyes of white poodles, but didn't want to change the name.

What's next?
Well, I have a plan, a WIP, and the beginning of a small experiment, so I can't even tell you what it will be, but I hope you'll be here when I can!