What is a Beautiful…Hand!

Are you the type of woman who goes to the Nail parlor every three or four weeks or so, to have her nails done?

But then, you look at your hands and are still dissatisfied?

In this post I would like to give you some handy tips for beautiful hands, not just your nails!
Do you have long acrylic nails? Or short gel (Shellac) overlay on your natural nails? Or maybe you have SNS nails, again an overlay over your natural nail, any of these are nail treatments to give your hands the beautiful extension to a well-kept hand.

But not everyone keeps their hands healthy and well, and these nail treatments may do just part of the “trick”, you need some down to earth, no fuss, handy tips for beautiful hands!

Taking Care of Hands

Your hands are really the most exposed piece of skin in your body, apart from your face.

Just think about it really, your hands go through soaps, chemicals, hot/cold air, hot/cold water, we scratch, we itch, we hit hard surfaces, we type, we cut, we write, we put our hands through our hair, we open doors, we push prams, we push shopping carts, we drive, we open car doors, we open trunks, we hang washing, we fold clothes, we change bed sheets…need I say more? The list is long and as you can see, we do much more with our hands than we ever put our conscious mind to it!

Using Hand Creams

Many of us are already aware that hand creams can be a “real life savior” or should I say a “real hands savior”! Yes, you need to use hand creams to rescue your hands from all the harsh, and many, actions we do every day! When you look at it, how many times do you put your hands under a running tap with soap, during the period of one day? Have you ever counted? Try, you’ll be surprised at the number!

I know that some of us have hand creams at every corner, at the ready for the next time we need it! I personally have one in my car, one in my hand bag, one in the living room, one in the kitchen and one in the bathroom/bedroom. I cannot do without my hand cream, as my hands feel dried up, really fast.

Now, I am not talking about the OCD problem of running and washing your hands every 5 minutes, that is a different story and I will not go into it here.

I am talking about regular day to day “hand management’.

When to Use Hand Creams

As I have mentioned above, I have hand creams in every nook and cranny so to have it handy! But I use hand cream and different types of hand creams depending on what I am doing and the time of the day it is. I am not saying that you have to do that, but a basic guideline is like this:

• Regular hand cream – for day to day, after washing dishes, vegetable, or any time.
• Silicone hand cream – for when I have to do hard work, gardening, hard house chores etc.
• Rich nourishing cream – at nighttime, when I go to sleep I give my hands a good nourishing dose to let then, recover from the day’s work, as it is at night that we have the restorative healing action going on in our bodies.

As you see there may be different times to use different hand creams. It really is up to you to choose what suits you best.

Aging and Hands

As we age the skin on our hands becomes thinner and some “age spots” start to appear. Something that can be quite disconcerting when you try to keep beautiful hands. Some “aggressive” treatments have been offered as silicone injections and Botox injections to plump up the skin, but in my opinion these are invasive and detrimental in the long term.

Preventative action is the best and most recommended way to keep your hands beautiful for the longest time.

Hand Scrubs

As a regular treatment to clear your skin ad enable rejuvenation of the upper layer of skin (the epidermis) you can use a gentle facial scrub once a week on your hands, wash your hands with it, rubbing and scrubbing gently all over down to the wrists’ area. After rinsing and drying well the hands, put on a nourishing cream to give your hands the well-deserved pampering they ought to have.

Naturally, I would recommend doing this weekly treatment at nighttime, just before bedtime, for maximum restorative effect.

Cuticle Care with Lip Balm!

As your nails grow, the thin layer of skin separating between your nails to your fingers – your cuticle – grows thinly on your nail, and often, as nature would have it when dry, they will tear off and cause quite a nuisance of a painful sting. I presume, that like most of us, you’d then, go and peel it off, or trim it with small nail scissors or even tear it with your teeth! Painful and does not resolve the actual problem as the skin keeps on peeling off anyway!

Caring for your cuticles is rather easy when you know what to do! First you need to keep your hands and cuticles well moisturized – helps it not to tear off. If and when it does tear, my trick is, to use lip balm and massage a small portion on each cuticle, and also where the peeling tear is. The lip balm is rich with moisture so it softens the cuticle and massaging the cuticle in a back stroke prevents the future (and painful) tearing of the skin.

Using lip balm on a painful torn cuticle, soothes the skin and enables the skin to heal quicker too!

For those of us who go to the nail parlor, we may have less of a problem with torn and painful cuticles as these get cleaned away by the nail technician as she manicures our hands.

My Handy Conclusion

Taking care of your hands should be part of your overall beauty routine and one that should not be ignored.

There are many hand creams on the market today, each one claiming and being able to offer great results. I have reviewed just but a few of them for now, there are many more to come, so stay tuned for more great information.

 

 

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