Now here’s something you don’t see often on here – a polish that’s close to my skin tone!

And…there’s a reason for that. As ridiculous as it sounds, these kind of shades intimidate me. I have no problem wearing loud and crazy manicures, but a soft and demure one like this makes me very self-conscious. (I feel like my nails are flashing you!) 😉

But I love trying new nail polishes because you never know when you’ll land a surprise winner.

This nail polish is OPI A Butterfly Moment from the Mariah Carey by OPI Collection, which will be in stores January 2013. It’s one of the Studio Shades.

P.S. Please excuse the indentations on my pinkie. I think it happened when I accidentally hit my hand on the bathroom door (owww!). I didn’t bother re-painting it because the imperfection didn’t bug me.

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OPI My Paprika Is Hotter Than Yours! comes from the Euro Centrale Collection, which will reach stores on February 6, 2013.

Do you like hot and spicy food? I enjoy a little kick, but when food is very spicy, I can no longer taste anything and just focus on the pain! My tolerance for spicy food is pretty poor.

One of my co-workers never ceases to astound us all, though. She loves jalapeño peppers and hot sauce. In fact, in the lunch room, we’re used to seeing her pour hot sauce over her meal like it’s ketchup! (To give you an idea of how spicy it is, just a small drop of it is enough to make my mouth burn.)

And she never seems to feel cold, even when the temperature’s been dropping. We think it’s because of all the sauce she consumes! 😉 It must get the blood circulating…

P.S. How cool is it that today is December 12, 2012? 12…12…12…

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OPI Can’t Find My Czechbook is the beautiful, clean blue nail polish from the Euro Centrale Collection coming out in February 2013.

Have you ever lost your wallet or had it stolen?

When I was around 9 or 10, I lost my wallet in the mall. (My parents thought somebody stole it, but I remember insisting that it had fallen out of my pocket even though I didn’t actually know which story was true. I just didn’t want to believe that someone would steal from a kid. Even as a child, I had my head in the clouds…)

It was such a bummer because it had $50 in it, which was a combined holiday and birthday gift from my grandparents. It was also the most they had ever given me, plus it was in a wallet I loved way more than the cash itself.

Yes, I cried like a baby. Having $50 was like winning the lottery, especially for a kid who never got weekly allowance from her parents!

(Doing household chores was expected without getting any reward in return. And, this is a great life lesson because we shouldn’t always be motivated to do something good based on a reward. Let’s just do good because it IS good!)

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I wore OPI Get Your Number last week, and couldn’t get enough of this manicure!

This is one of the Stage Shades from the Mariah Carey by OPI Collection. It has the new finish that OPI is coining ‘Liquid Sand’. You’ll see it in stores starting January 2013.

Before trying this, I’ve always been interested in matte nail polish, but I was never blown away by any.

That all changed when I wore Get Your Number! It came as quite the shock. Sure, I expected to like it, but to fall head over heels in love with it? Is OPI lacing the lacquers with some sort of drug? 😉

It must be said – Get Your Number is the most memorable and intriguing nail polish I have worn in all of 2012! That is saying a lot because I typically polish my nails a few times each week!

If you haven’t been interested in matte polishes before, I still urge you to give this one a try. It’s extremely different than anything I’ve ever seen or worn.

Please note that I tried my best to capture the interesting features of this polish, but it was such a diva! I didn’t do it justice, but I tried various lighting conditions and changing the focus (since blurring the focus helped me show the holographic glitter in this.)

I’ll also share a photo of how it looks with a shiny top coat, in case you absolutely must wear a top coat. However, I strongly recommend you wear this as is for even just a day. It has such an interesting finish!

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OPI Vant to Bite My Neck? is a dark purple from the Euro Centrale Spring/Summer Collection coming out in February 2013.

If you’ve followed Swatch And Learn for a little while, you may have noticed that I don’t maintain a nail length. I sport all different lengths from little nubs like in today’s post to longer nails. (It’s not because I’m crazy. Well, okay, maybe just a smidgeon. I just appreciate diversity, and perhaps I’m a little indecisive. Maybe…I haven’t decided! Haha, kidding! I did that on purpose.)

I trimmed my nails super short quite a few days ago, but you’re just seeing it recently because there’s a bit of a lag between the manicure I wear and when it gets published on here. (You’ll probably notice that more when one day my nails are really short and then the next day, they’re much longer. Sometimes I upload manicures out of order. I swear I haven’t been drinking the werewolf’s Kool-Aid…even though it’s supposedly delicious!) 😉

The first polish I reached for after trimming my nails was Vant to Bite My Neck? because I just love how chic dark shades look on short nails.

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