Dirty fingernails?

I have a good friend who suffers terrible Psoriasis and Excema. Several years ago I made her hand creams from a recipe that I got from the internet. The main Ingredients were shea butter, almond oil, cocoa butter, horse chestnut oil and a few other ingredients. after using that she never had raw exposed splits and open cracks in her knuckles again. Her hands used to bleed everyday and most commercial soaps and creams caused her agony. She had spent hundreds of dollars on prescriptions and creams from the dermatologist.

Not the same as vasaline, Stormy, it's the lanolin that helps so much. Try using just a little dab and rubbing it in well. Then it's not so messy and greasy and a lot cheaper. Just trying to save Spooky some money.

SO had to use the cotton gloves because his hands were a mess - completely raw and broken out and splitting. His exzema is awful. Slathering on the Bag Balm and using it overnight helped him heal faster. Once we got him healed, he was able to just use a little dab every day to keep his hands from getting raw and covered in rash.

I got some pure lanolin at the health food store one time - that was really messy and sticky, so much so I couldn't use it. Bag Balm is better.

I used lanolin when I was breast feeding. Worked on them.

I've sometimes used Lanolin in my hand cream recipes, but actually have found almond oil to be superior.

I like almond oil too. What's the door to door cosmetics that has pink as their trademark color? I used to get a hand lotion with almond oil from them that was really good, not so much for cracked skin or any irritation but for dry skin.

No wonder that hemp lotion is so good, Stormy. Lots of good stuff in it and it's anti-inflammatory.

"Hemp seed oil contains 57% linoleic (LA) and 19% linolenic (LNA) acids and antioxidants in the form of vitamin E and carotene. Phytosterols, phospholipids, as well as a number of minerals, including calcium, magnesium, sulfur, potassium and phosphorus are also found in the oil.

Benefits of hemp seed oil in skin care
The hemp seed oil that is used for cosmetics and skin care products contains a high amount of polyunsaturated essential fatty acids (linoleic and linolenic acids), which makes it an important ingredient in anti-inflammatory skin care formulations.
For this reason it is beneficial, as it helps to heal skin lesions, balance dry skin and fight skin inflammations.
It is a non-greasy, emollient and moisturizing compound with excellent anti-aging and moisture balancing properties."

Okay, they had me until they got to anti-aging. LOL Everybody claims that with little or no proof. But the other stuff is interesting. BTW, zinc (the white stuff they put in diaper rash creams and some sun lotion) is also anti-inflammatory. I use it all the time for my rosacea and any little skin bump or rash that shows up along with Paula's Choice BHA lotion, which is also great for rosacea.

Hart, my hand cream making is sort of a Rogaine story. I was not going for a hand cream. Myself and several friends suffer from various forms of diabetic itch. It's a very strange thing that affects everyone in different ways. Mostly it makes one body part itch like crazy. Each of us had run the gamut of every recommended product with no relief.

One friend has it under her chin and on the front of her left upper arm. Another friend has it on her right wrist and inside her right elbow. Mine is on the back of my neck extending over to the outside of my right shoulder. I suffered with it for 5 years. One year of using my concoction and it is gone. Haven't used the cream in 3 years. My friends have had the same results.

The hand cream was just a suggestion that I half heartedly made to my excema afflicted friend as I had noticed wonders on my hands since working with the creams. The hand cream is an unfinished product. As it does not need to be very spreadable like the body lotion, the last ingredient and heating and emulsification steps aren't needed. The hand cream needs to be refrigerated as I could not add ascorbic acid to it as a preservative, because the acid was painful to my friend's open wounds. I actually refrigerate all cosmetics that are "Natural" for preservative reasons. Make them harder to spread in some instances.

I wasn't criticizing your cream, Stormy, just suggesting something cheaper. I'll bet the homemade cream is wonderful. The hemp oil is interesting. The only problem is after you use it, your hands get the munchies. LOL

Didn't think you were, Hart. Former hippies and their pot stories!!!!!

My nieces are really into 60's & 70's music and are always asking me what memories a particular song recalls. Sunday they asked about a Santana song and I replied, "Sunday afternoons in the park drinking Boone's Farm from a wine sack"!

Oh, gosh, that was the most awful rotgut wine on earth, wasn't it? LOL

I dunno, I preferred it to Strawberry Hill.

Aaaaaagh! Blech!

Hey, I found a source for those white nail brushes I was raving about. They're only 75 or 50 cents apiece depending on how many you buy with free shipping, even for tiny orders.

http://www.prosoap.com/nailbrush

Warning - there's a very annoying and loud video if you go to some of the other pages. Just click the x under the woman speaking to shut her up. LOL

Thanks Hart I went and ordered 10 of them we will see how they do on my toes. LOL

I don't know about toes. LOL I use that looped foot brush I posted above on my grubby toes and feet. Get you one - they have them at Walmart cheap.

In case you missed it, my muddy foot and Croc.

Just bought some of those nail brushes...great find, Diane!!!

Has anyone tried 'Liquid Gloves'? I got talked into a bottle at the Flower Show; unfortunately, I always forget to put it on BEFORE going out to work.

I wear glove liners and gloves, and my nails still get filthy. I even stopped going to the manicurist because I couldn't bear the (evident) condemnation.

I'm so happy to hear that others have 'awful garnders' hands.'

(And, sure, my feet are a horror, as well.)

oops: gardeners'

We know what you meant. LOL Try some of those brushes, Sissy. You can't beat 50-75 cents and free shipping.

Sissy, Once a week I add a cap full of chlorox to the dish water. The sink, dish cloth, coffee cups and my hands are incredibly transformed! So are a few of my tee shirts. LOL Now I've never dipped my tootsies in the kitchen sink!!!

As a teenager I tried to bleach my nails to make them whiter and brighter. Sat with the tips of my fingers in little dishes of pure chlorox soaking them. Next day I had these red lines running up my fingers from the nails and the skin looked burned and blistered. Never tried that again. The things teenagers will do for beauty. LOL

Ouch, Holly! Stormy, doesn't that make your hands smell like bleach? I hate bleach smell on my hands and that slime feeling although lemon juice will work on both the smell and the slime.

Our well water is so full of iron, it stains all the sinks, tubs and toilet rust brown. Even dishes and glasses get a veneer of rust color on them over time. I use the Works spray or Bartenders Friend to get rid of it. Works better than bleach on rust stains. I don't have to use a lot either. I wouldn't use it on my nails. LOL I use a rust eating powder in my washer from time to time to keep whites from turning brown or yellowish I have found that new Clorox works well too.

Hart, the smell goes away quickly. Heck, all summer I smell like garlic & basile & mint. I'm always slathering excess olive oil on my hands and arms whenever I oil the cutting boards, knife handles and fruit bowls or just have some left in a bowl. Olive oil, lemon juice and chlorox. Some potent magic there!

Holly, did you mayonnaise your hair and egg whip pimples? My nieces get really grossed out about setting your hair with beer. Sometimes I rub some of the olive oil in my hair in the dead of winter. Remember the peroxide and lemon juice sprays in the hair? Cucumber slices on the eyes? The oatmeal and milk baths of Twiggy's day?

I was getting such bad tears recently around the base of my nails from digging in the rocks around here, I rubbed olive oil on them after nothing else worked and it worked like a charm.

Did you ever set your hair with sugar water? It was about the same as Dippity Do - sticky! LOL

I just ordered some of those nail brushes, too. Thanks for the tip! I have some others made by Kent but they don't quite do the trick. I'll have to try the lemon juice, too. And the toenail issue is also something I'm dealing with. I usually don't wear my Crocs in the garden; I use Birkenstock clogs. But if I don't wash them out all the time the dirt collects in the toes of the clogs and of course thence to the toes of my feet! Makes it hard to wear sandals!

Lets, see I used stale beer to set my hair, iodine and baby oil for tanning and lemon juice and peroxide for lightening the hair. I lived in the city so after we oiled ourselves up and sprayed our hair we would crawl thru my bedroom window and lay on the very hot flat tar roof. Oh yes I was one "Hot Chick" in my day. LOL

Just ordered the nail brushes. And I'll try the lemon juice. Thanks

Have a teenage girl here- let me tell you, everything that you think can do anything for you is now bought ready to go in a pretty bottle, for $$. Or she's spoiled.
I favor sandals/'flipflops for summer digging, thus a stripey dirt effect

Sally, you and Ric must have matching feet. LOL I've seen him out shoveling snow in those flipflops.

Hart, Never heard of the sugar water trick. Dippedy Do was pretty good stuff.

Holly, No way can I imagine you as a city gal!

Greenhousegal, I even find dirt piled up in the toes of my sneakers.

I always wear a gardening apron. Holds all of my tools and junk. The pockets end up full of dirt, which of course gets under my finger nails.

Yep, Grew up in Harrisburg probably close to 20 before I moved and then to a suburb before settling out here, and I will say that there are things that I do miss about city life. Maybe just childhood memories and living in the city wouldn't be the same as I remember. My old neighborhood sure isn't the same anymore. I liked that you could walk most of the places that you wanted to go to. I also like the city parks and they have nice programs, free music concerts and art shows in the city. Out here it is get in the car and drive if you want to go anywhere. We do sometimes drive in for activities and I don't know if I could take that many neighbors any more, I do like my privacy,

Holly, you were one very hot chick! Rotisseried chicken even. LOL I can't imagine you as a city slicker either.

I was looking at someone's garden photos in another board the other day and seeing how close their neighbors were and thinking, "Boy, I wouldn't like that any more."

A cheap cotton nail apron makes a nice garden apron. You can get them in the tool section of any hardware store. I haven't shown you all my new garden cart, have I? I'll have to post a photo of it somewhere. I like a small cart to lug things around in, or even just a bucket.

Holly, I learned to swim in the Susquahanna (can't remember how you spell it) River as a little girl over on the Island. Harrisburg was my second home, my aunt lived on Herr Street when it was really a nice section of town and I spent many fun times there. I thought it was great going to the big city as a kid from the country.

Jen, I am amazed that a Jersey Girl has dirty fingernails. I thought we were always seen with big hair and long nails. Well, maybe in the Sopranos but not in the real world here in Burlington County. I agree, the lemon juice works great.

This has been fun listening to you all trying to garden and look like ladies. I gave up and have a pedicure and a manicure every two weeks. But at my age, I am allowed. You got to be over 65 to do that. LOL. My kids used to make fun of my dirty feet and nails. I love bare feet but not outside anymore. As you get older your feet get more tender. I was raised in the country in Lancaster County, PA and the Amish kids and Mennonite kids always went barefoot in the summer. I sometimes wonder how we did it. I love fun memories. Thanks for bringing them back to me. Have a good weekend. JB

JBerger, I know Herr St. We lived "out on the hill" just off Market not far from Reservoir Park, I learned to swim at the YWCA down town and Pembroke pool in the summer. I remember the beach at City Island, it is still there and they have spruced up City Island with a baseball park, horse and carriage rides, mini golf a couple of small rides for little kids and some good food. I am lucky to say that I had a great childhood and wonderful parents and family.

Holly, I remember Reservoir Park also. My cousins all went to the Y and used to swim in the big , I can't remember what they called it, swim thing and boat thing they had in the River each year. Those of us who had great childhoods and families are few and far between anymore. It seems this younger generation (and I am not saying you are old, I AM 80), have many more family problems than we ever did. Of course, the difference is too, in the old days you did not talk about them. You lived with them and shut up about it. LOL Have a good day. Hope the rain soon stops. JB

Did anybody try any of these solutions? Did they work?

I didn't find those white plastic nail brushes especially helpful. I haven't tried the foot brushes that people offered links to, though. Went through the season with hobbit toes AND nails!

greenhouse_gal, I was so lazy this year that I hardly ever put on a pair of my Atlas gloves. So much for good intentions.

I did make it a point though to always wear socks in the garden, so the feet are pretty good. I will confess to having to have had to bleach my hands several times.

Geez Stormy, Holly and I call our grubby garden feet, Hobbit Feet! It's a matter of pride, who's the grubbiest! LOL Ric

Yeah, but then you're off at an event where you want to look civilized, wearing your Birkenstocks, and you feel like you need to hide those feet from view!

That's what shoes are for. LOL :-) Ric