I love to get my bare hands in the dirt but my skin does not. I hated all gardening gloves until I tried Atlas Nitrile Touch gloves: http://www.lfsinc.com/atlasgloves/garden.htm and what I do is keep about a dozen pairs near me when I'm gardening so that I can quickly put on a clean pair if the one I'm wearing gets too wet. Later, I throw all the dirty ones in the laundry. In three years I have not worn out a single pair!

Professional Nail technician here: There are several different types of "Gel Nails" THEY ARE NOT ALL THE SAME! ***ASK YOUR SALON WHAT BRAND THEY'RE USING ON YOU!!! The GENUINE CND SHELLAC BRAND does NOT -EVER- need to be filed off ever! The other brands such as Gelish, Axxium, etc are TOTALLY DIFFERENT! They are true Gels, so with this product, the entire natural nail bed needs to be filed on top of the nail and the surface etched (taken off) = nail damage for the product to attach properly. The new nail growth at the cuticle also needs to be filed for adhesion EACH TIME A NEW MANICURE IS PERFORMED WITH THOSE TRUE GEL PRODUCTS. Also, with each new manicure, the top coat seal needs to be filed off (yet again) -off the top of the nails to allow the acetone to penetrate and take the gel off. Remember, every time you file off a layer of the top of your nails, you're making them thinner and thinner. PEOPLE WONDER WHY THEIR NAILS ARE BEING DAMAGED? True Gels are just as damaging as Acrylic Nails. Many nail technicians/salons call anything "Shellac". KNOW WHAT YOU'RE GETTING! ONLY THE CND SHELLAC BRAND is a true non-nail damage soak off gel-hybrid.(Hybrid means: Not a true gel, not a polish). Your nail technician should use nothing stronger than a WOOD (not metal) cuticle stick to scrape off any remaining soft gel during the removal process -after the 10 min Acetone removal process. NO FILING!!! NO FILING!!! If any filing is necessary, it is NOT the Shellac brand! I also would like to make another BIG caution as well... I myself am very cautious regarding products unregulated and coming from China. I only buy CND BRAND SHELLAC, & CND lamps and bulbs from an authorized Creative Nail Design (CND) distributor. If a salon buys a knock-off or other manufactured nail lamp from China, with no regulation, health importation checks, or company quality control, how do you know how much UV strength is actually being emitted from those bulbs? How do you know what is in that polish? How about the ingredients? How do you know if ingredients in a non-CND product are coming from Japan (radiation)? I personally would NEVER fool around with my own health or the health of my clients by buying knock-off products for this item. It's not worth the few dollars per item to save. I am not against buying knock-off's in some situations, but I do not buy knock-off's from the internet etc. for anything I put on my body or face that can be absorbed, or ingested. You just don't know what's in them.

I do think that there is a bit of a learning curve to the Incoco strips, I didn't get them on perfectly, and then they stayed on so long that I was forced to see my imperfect application for two weeks! And I did have more difficulty applying to my right hand. For the french manicure set the white strip is separate, and I believe that it is applied first, then the sheer pink over top. I think that you could probably buy just the white tips and apply your own sheer polish over the top. These things stay on so well that you could probably remove the top coat of sheer and repolish after a week or so if you wanted to.

bpath, read the fine print and see if they're the kind I used decades ago. So many look like the original but they're too flexible, aka thinner than they used to be, and the grit # varies. Morz, a big no to the metal ones, those give me creeps when using them, except to clean under my nails. I'm making a Walmart pickup (only large grocery store around) and I'll see if they have an inexpensive glass file, and also get some sturdy and rough emory boards....if I can find them. I do my own nails maybe 4 times a year and I finally found the perfect nail color. Actually it's a nail concealer which I'd never heard of before until I read how great it was in some article. No bottom or top coat required and mine lasted 3 weeks! The bottle looks gray online but look at the hand model's fingernails. One coat also does the trick. Kur Illuminating Nail Concealer by Londontown..worth the price! Not as bright in person.