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You Can Have Beautiful Hands
Give Yourself A Manicure
Show off your hands! Step-by-step instructions for a complete at home manicure. Your hands will thank you.
1. Remove your old nail polish with non-acetone remover, using cotton balls. File your nails from corner to corner being sure to go staright across not back and forth to prevent nails fron peeling or slitting. File the sides at a 45 degree angle. Look for soft files and avoid emery boards.
2. Soak your nails in warm soapy water for a few minutes. Now dry your hands and put cuticle remover on cuticle's and let soak. Your cuticle should dissolve.
3. Push cuticle back very gently with an orange wood stick wrapped in thin cotton. If you have a hang nail (loose skin around your nail), trim it with nippers.
4. Apply hand lotion, and massage around the nail and cuticle area. Doing this prevents to cuticle from becoming dried out and helps promote nail growth.
5. Remove any oil from your nails by putting them back in the soapy water and brushing with a nail brush. Or you can use your facial astringent applied with cotton balls to remove oil.
6. Polish: apply a base coat or nail strengthener to keep the polish from staining your nails and to make color stay on better. Now apply 2 coats of color polish. Use just three or four strokes. Let dry for a few moments in between coats. Now apply a topcoat. This will prevent the polish from chipping and give your nails a glossy finish.
Hot Oil Hand Treatment
This one's easy: heat olive oil in a dish. Soak fingers a few minutes to soften cuticles and strengthen nails. Save oil for step two: Step 2 Hand Treatment/Massage
Do this when you've got absolutely nothing left to do in the evening. Take honey and almond scrub mix (recipe below), massage into hands and arms for 10 minutes. Wrap hands tightly in hot hand towel, leave on for 10 minutes. Remove towels, rinse, dry and apply hot olive oil (left over from the simple hand treatment). Massage into hands, wrap hands in paper toweling or inexpensive cotton gloves. Put plastic bag over each towel wrapped/gloved hand, seal shut with rubber band around wrist. This will create a terrarium effect, locking in the moisture. Keep in place for 10 minutes.
Honey and Almond Scrub
Use half of a small jar of cold cream as your base. Add to it 1 tsp. honey. Whir slivered Almonds in a blender till they are as fine as freshly ground pepper, mix with cold cream, and you have an inexpensive scrub.Quick hand and Nail Tips
Give Yourself A Manicure
Show off your hands! Step-by-step instructions for a complete at home manicure. Your hands will thank you.
1. Remove your old nail polish with non-acetone remover, using cotton balls. File your nails from corner to corner being sure to go staright across not back and forth to prevent nails fron peeling or slitting. File the sides at a 45 degree angle. Look for soft files and avoid emery boards.
2. Soak your nails in warm soapy water for a few minutes. Now dry your hands and put cuticle remover on cuticle's and let soak. Your cuticle should dissolve.
3. Push cuticle back very gently with an orange wood stick wrapped in thin cotton. If you have a hang nail (loose skin around your nail), trim it with nippers.
4. Apply hand lotion, and massage around the nail and cuticle area. Doing this prevents to cuticle from becoming dried out and helps promote nail growth.
5. Remove any oil from your nails by putting them back in the soapy water and brushing with a nail brush. Or you can use your facial astringent applied with cotton balls to remove oil.
6. Polish: apply a base coat or nail strengthener to keep the polish from staining your nails and to make color stay on better. Now apply 2 coats of color polish. Use just three or four strokes. Let dry for a few moments in between coats. Now apply a topcoat. This will prevent the polish from chipping and give your nails a glossy finish.
Hot Oil Hand Treatment
This one's easy: heat olive oil in a dish. Soak fingers a few minutes to soften cuticles and strengthen nails. Save oil for step two: Step 2 Hand Treatment/Massage
Do this when you've got absolutely nothing left to do in the evening. Take honey and almond scrub mix (recipe below), massage into hands and arms for 10 minutes. Wrap hands tightly in hot hand towel, leave on for 10 minutes. Remove towels, rinse, dry and apply hot olive oil (left over from the simple hand treatment). Massage into hands, wrap hands in paper toweling or inexpensive cotton gloves. Put plastic bag over each towel wrapped/gloved hand, seal shut with rubber band around wrist. This will create a terrarium effect, locking in the moisture. Keep in place for 10 minutes.
Honey and Almond Scrub
Use half of a small jar of cold cream as your base. Add to it 1 tsp. honey. Whir slivered Almonds in a blender till they are as fine as freshly ground pepper, mix with cold cream, and you have an inexpensive scrub.Quick hand and Nail Tips
- Flaky skin - Mix 1 cup of boiling water with 1/2 cup of bran and let cool. Immerse hands into mixture and massage into hands. Rinse with warm water and follow with a hand moisturizer.
- To Quickly dry fingernail polish, dip your nails in ice water. The polish will harden much faster
- Acrylic nails - Almond oil will stop acrylic nails from dehydrating and coming away from the nail plate.
- Help for nails that won't grow--Mix 1 packet unflavored gelatin with 1 tablespoon almond oil. Store in an airtight container at room temperature. Massage into nails daily to help grow them long and strong.
- Rough cuticles - Wet fingertips with water and dip them into cornmeal. Massage and rinse with tepid water. Buff nails with a nail brush while rinsing to make sure you remove all the cornmeal. Dry thoroughly and apply hand cream.
- For brittle nails, Once a week, apply almond oil to nails and hands, cover with socks or gloves and wear them overnight.
- Discolored fingernails - Dissolve a tablet of denture cleanser in warm water and soak fingers until the stains disappear.
- Discolored nails - Whiten your nails by mixing 1 tablespoon hydrogen peroxide with 3 tablespoons baking soda. Apply to nails (underneath and over tops) with a cotton swab. Leave on for 3-5 minutes then rise with warm water. Apply hand lotion.
- To strengthen and shine nails, combine 2 teaspoons of salt, 2 teaspoons castor oil, and 1 teaspoons wheat germ oil and mix thoroughly. Pour into a bottle. Shake before using. To use, rub a small amount into your nails. Leave on 3-5 minutes and tissue off. Follow up with more plain castor oil, if desired
- Revitalizing hand wrap: Coat hands with lotion. Slip into roomy plastic gloves, then into warm gloves. Leave on 30 minutes. Remove plastic and warm gloves, then tissue off excess lotion.
- Chapped hands - Put a pair of cotton gloves in the dryer to warm. Massage olive oil into hands, nails and cuticles. Slip on warm gloves. You might want someone to help you! Leave on for 20 minutes or overnight.
- Hangnails - Pierce a 400 IU-vitamin E capsule and massage a drop into hangnail to soften and speed healing.
- For nails that are nourished from the inside out--Try supplementing your already healthy eating plan with MSM. This natural sulfur source from the sea speeds the growth of your hair and nails.
- To help your nail polish glide on--Dip a cotton ball in a facial astringent to remove any excess oil on your nails. Your polish will go on much smoother.
- Best nail shape - Fingers look longer and more slender with straight-sided nails that have slightly rounded tips. This shape is the most flattering for short nails too and will help make hands look more graceful.
- Protect your hands from the sun--Keep a tube of hand cream with sunscreen in your car and apply before you get on the road. Incidental sun exposure will give you age spots.
- Brittle nails - Rub a waxy lip balm into nails 3 times a day to protect, condition and seal in moisture.
- Protect your hands - Smooth on an enriched hand lotion before you put on your rubber gloves for a beauty treatment while you work.
- To reduce polish from nails you've messed up, don't hold remover saturated cotton with totally polished fingertips... they'll get smeared. Instead use a tip of a Q-tip saturated in nail polish remover.
- You don't want to wear polish? Apply white iodine to nails. It makes them strong.
- Filing - Never file nails right after a shower or after they have been in water. They will be too soft and tear very easily.
- Clean nails - Scrub your nails with a nail brush every day. Clean nails are beautiful nails even if short.
- Ridges - Using a soft nail disc, buff ridges horizontally using a gentle back and forth motion. Do not over buff. Once your ridges are smoothed, rub in lotion
