And he, HE HIMSELF! The Grinch carved the Roast Beast!

"So have a merry Christmas, a Happy Hanukkah, Kwazy Kwanzaa, a tip-top Tet, and a solemn & dignified Ramadan." - Krusty the Klown

Republic of Doyle

At the beginning of December, Republic of Doyle was filming downtown St. John's. So what better nails to do than Republic nails. On the right hand is Jake in his car, Malachy on the index, the CBC logo in the middle, Des on the ring and some stylized row houses on the pinkie. On the left hand is Jake's car, CBC logo in middle, the Narrows on the ring, and the Republic of Newfoundland flag on the pinkie. I was going to do Rose on the index but didn't have a colour I thought would work for her hair so it was left blank. Also included is a picture of the car they blew up for Season 3.

Remembrance Day 2011

This year I divided my nails between the top and the bottom. On the right hand is the somewhat official view. Based off their military flags (according to the poster hanging on my wall) these fingers feature the modern umbrella groups of the Canadian military. On the index finger is Air Command, on the middle Land Forces Command, and on the ring Maritime Command (excluding the crown due to spacing issues). On the right is a Great War soldier's view. Based off works by my personal favourite Great War artist, Otto Dix. The image on the index is from "Storm Troops Advancing Under a Gas Attack". The middle is taken from "Transporting the Wounded in Houthulst Forest" and the ring from "Machine Gunners Advance". Poppies are on the pinky fingers. The thumbs are red, white and blue camouflage taken from the Remembrance Day mask of Carey Price.

Halloween 2011

These were my Halloween nails for 2011. My favourite was the spider on the web. On the left hand a witch, bat, spider, ghost and tombstone for Bram Stoker (1847-1912). On the right, Frankenstein, a cat, a jack-o-lantern, some mis-coloured candy corn and a tombstone for Mary Shelley (1797-1851).

All Blacks - Rugby World Cup 2011

This was my year to start getting into international rugby. Unfortunately due to time zones and a great desire not to get up at 5 in the morning I only caught the semi-final and final games live. As a not-so-much rugby fan but if-I-were-I'd-be-an-All-Blacks-fan, I was going for the team with the 24 year drought and did my nails for them. Jumped on that bandwagon just in time too, watching them become world champions for the second time while eating New Zealand kiwis (it seemed as good a reason as any to buy kiwis).

Montreal Canadiens

For no reason this has taken me a long time to upload. For the start of hockey season I pulled out the classic Canadiens design. It worked well for the Jets game, then came the crushing reality of the Habs under-performing each subsequent game. Including a loss to the Panthers. The PANTHERS! Then a win against the Flyers and the Bruins. Most excellent. Back on track (hopefully).

As a note on nails, you can see the thumb on the right hand cracked. It'll be short for the next while as it grows back. And the middle finger is covered because I did not paint it, I cut around the cuticle area with a box (I don't know why boxes and I don't get along, but that is life) and it was bandaged when I was switching from the Scream to this.

The Scream

When I got the suggestion to do the Van Gogh nails, I thought that it may also be fun to do Edvard Munch's "The Scream". In retrospect, I think the entire painting should've been on all the nails - not just the right thumb - but it's acceptable as is. So right thumb is a mini-nail-reproduction of the painting. On the remainder of the right nails are just the face and partial body of The Scream with the blues and greys of the water. On the left hand are 3 increasingly close faces. The original had a bit of yellow but when I tried to add it with nail polish I don't think it came off so well. On the thumb is "Munch" and on the index finger is "The Scream". It reminds me of an old horror movie poster. The shape the text is on was meant to mimic the torso of The Scream.

Liverpool FC - Yet another incarnation

At the end of August I did a new set of Liverpool FC nails. Originally, the plan was to have the red background and mini portraits of the starting lineup (for the Bolton game) done in white. It would have not included Reina since I lack an extra finger for the entire 11 men. I hit a snag, 3 times, in the attempt to do Enrique. Because of his facial stubble he kept turning out looking like Santa Claus. In a fit of frustration, all the portraits that were completed to that point were removed (there were only 3 others) and a very simple design with the outline of the LFC crest and the squad numbers was included. On the bottom was a banner with TIA (This is Anfield). So, on the right hand: Suarez (7), Kuyt (18), Downing (19), Adam(26), Leiva (21). On the left: Reina (25), Kelly (34), Carragher(23), Henderson (14), Agger (5). In this set, Enrique didn't get make cut.

My toes were done as well this round. The grey nailpolish was already on the coffee table so I just used that but added hearts on the big toes for... interest?

Starry Night

A couple weeks ago a friend sent me a link to a video of a girl who had done Vincent Van Gogh's "Starry Night" on her nails and suggested that I try it out. It got a bit lost in the shuffle of Harry Potter and FC Bayern nails but when that latter one came off I figured if I didn't do it now, it might be quite a while. Not an ideal finished product but I'm thinking for my first attempt it went pretty well. I will probably try them again in a couple months and see if I can improve on the execution. This has also suggested the option of more masterpieces reproduced for nail-scale. Forefront in my mind is "The Scream". Anyway, I'm quite liking these and the bartender today enjoyed them as well so they'll stay on for a little while at least.

FC Bayern 2011-2012

I finished these nails a week ago in honour of the DFB-Pokal campaign beginning. And Bayern won, moving on to round 2. Not so fortunate today when the Bundesliga campaign kicked off with a 1 nil loss to Borussia Mönchengladbach. I did the toes as well this time round with the colours from the centre of Bayern's crest/the Coat of Arms of Bavaria.

Harry Potter

For the last movie, Harry Potter nails. I did these the Saturday after the movie release. On the pinkies are wands with some magic swirls... See movie poster for reference. On the rings is "HP", the middle fingers have the lightning bolts, the indexes the Gryffindor colours. On the right thumb is Harry in profile: on the left, Voldemort in profile. I don't actually like how these turned out but I've kept them on because I didn't want to take them off.

Summer in St. John's

From the request of a friend my nails got decked out for tourist season in St. John's. On the fingers some jellybean row nails based off the colourful houses of downtown St. John's. The left hand has some classic primary colours (and green) while the right incorporates some more modern shades such as the orange and purple houses... though there might not be an actual house that shade of purple. Yet. On the thumb of the right hand is Cabot Tower on Signal Hill with a Union Jack just for the fun of it. And former British Colony and all that. On the right is a puffin because they're pretty fun even though I've never seen one.

Canada Day/Memorial Day 2011

July 1st is Canada Day and for the past few years I've always done red and white nails with maple leafs - except last year because I had World Cup nails. It has also always been a bit difficult because I didn't have my nail polishes with little brushes and it's very difficult to work with either a normal sized polish brush or a toothpick. My first design with little brushes were actually maple leafs for the Olympics in 2010 but they turned out pretty badly. This year was my chance to go all out. On the right hand I have little RCMP officers in the red serge and two Canadian flags. On the left fingers I have the beginning notes for O Canada (the part that coincides with the singing of "O Canada".

July 1st is also the first day of the assault on the Somme in the Great War. For the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, this was one of their major contributions to the war and the Regiment was very nearly wiped out in that single action. For Newfoundlanders, July 1st is also Memorial Day. I payed a little homage to the RNR by including the bottom half of a soldier with blue puttees (Blue Puttees being the nickname for the first soldiers due to them having blue puttees...) on the left thumb.

Purple

The riot nails quickly passed from 'keeping up with recent events' to 'yesterday's news'. In the week or so before Canada Day I occupied the interim with somewhat basic nails. The base was "Cloud" by Revlon. The tips were done in a purple sparkle. This is the retirement design for that particular shade as the polish has reached the end of its usable life. On the seam between the tip and the main colour I did a band of silver with some purple dots that matched the tip colour. While taking photos of these the cat wanted to play so I incorporated her in one photo and she walked in front of the camera for the other.