World Cup 2014 Knockouts

Nails for the knockout rounds. Jersey colours on the thumbs, index, and middle fingers. Lahm 16 on the ring fingers, and German flag colours on the pinkies. I do not have mini eagle gems (if they exist I definitely should get them), so did hearts as the crest. Seemed fitting.

German hearts on the big toes.

I think I'm all ready for Europe now!

World Cup 2014

 In just under two weeks I'll be heading to Europe (and will be hopefully watching Germany win the World Cup while in Munich). These are my group stages nails. The Eagle on the right hand with stars, and Deutschland 2014 with German flag colours on the left. On the thumbs, 16 (Lahm) done in the colours of the 2014 kit.

I'll have to do knock out round nails before I leave and am currently thinking about possible ideas.

Berlin Turns 775

 This year is Berlin's 775th anniversary so I decided to do Berlin nails. While the original concept was to have a variety of images from throughout the last few centuries, when I actually sat down to do them it ended up being largely centred on post-Second World War. On the left hand are images from the Berlin Wall. The middle finger had a black silhouette of the Brandenburg Gate so I chose not to do another image of it on the right hand. The thumb is the image of Brezhnev and Honecker (Soviet and East German leaders respectively).

On the right hand are the Ampelmännchen (the traffic light men), the middle finger (which is also in the process of breaking) is the crown from the coat of arms, and on the thumb part of a map of the Berlin city centre.The pinky is just the German flag with 775.

Euro 2012 Knock-out Rounds/Canada Day

The finals of Euro 2012 fall on Canada Day this year, so these nails serve a double purpose. On the thumbs is a mini-Canada tribute with 1¢ on the left thumb and the maple leaves and 1¢ on the right thumb. This is also a tribute to the penny, which is being phased out. In a rare shout-out to the nailpolish used, I've included a pre-design image of the thumb using "Magnetic Force" polish. The variations in colour are achieved by hovering a magnet over the wet polish. I thought it was pretty cool and turned out really interesting. 

The fingernails are stars in the German colours and little football player silhouettes also done in the German colours. Nothing too complex, but hopefully it'll be lucky for the knockout rounds. So far so good, with Germany moving on to the semi-finals.

UEFA Euro 2012 - Group Stages

 UEFA Euro 2012 nails.

Both thumbs have the Poland-Ukraine Euro logo with "EURO 2012". On the right hand, German eagles. On the left, the flags of all the group countries. Group A: Poland, Greece, Russia and Czech Republic. Group B: Netherlands, Denmark, GERMANY!!!, and Portugal. Group C: Spain, Italy, Republic of Ireland, and Croatia. Group D: Ukraine, Sweden, England, France.

2010 World Cup KO Round

For the Knock-Out round the nails changed to German jerseys. After losing 2 goalkeepers to suicide and injury, it was wonderful to see Neuer perform so well and see the entire team come together under Philipp Lahm's captaincy. Their loss ushered in a period of mourning for me, but they played beautifully in the 3rd place game. It was only unfortunate that Klose couldn't beat the goal-scorer record.
16: Lahm (captain)
7: Schweinsteiger (vice-captain)
10: Podolski
11: Klose
6: Khedira
1: Neuer
8: Özil
21: Marin
17: Mertesacker
2: Jansen

World Cup 2010 Group Stages

My first sport love is football (aka soccer) though I'm a rather recent convert to that as well. In 2006 the first full match I ever watched was the opening game of Germany v Costa Rica. Lahm scored and he would later inform which Bundesliga team I supported. That's another story. Regardless, I had high hopes for Deutschland in South Africa and began the Group Stages with German eagles.