Tip: Beautiful Hands

If, like myself, you bite your nails, or, unlike me, have really dry skin on your hands, the chances are that at some point or other, you've suffered from something called "hand nail". This sounds pretty scary, I have to admit, but it isn't as grotesque as the name probably implies.

Hang nail is when a small part of the skin around the nail breaks, and is caused, as you might guess by either having very dry skin, or nail biting. The worst part about hang nails, isn't necessarily how ugly they are (because they're really not very attractive), but how painful they can be. Unfortunately, that pain is never helped by the inane need to pick at it, or worse bite it, in fact, doing either of these will definitely make it worse for you.

Instead of picking or gnawing it off (that really does sound gross!), the key is to understand the cause, and to combat that cause, which is dried out skin. So, the remedy is to moisturise, of course!

Nevertheless, it's easy to reach for your favourite hand cream, but if you find that you've run out, or the boyfriend has stolen it (despite his profuse protests to the contrary), all is most definitely not lost. The solution?

Olive Oil.

No, really. Olive oil is actually incredibly nourishing, and works at building up your skins elasticity. I know Olive Oil doesn't smell quite as nice as moisturisers, but most of us have it already in our kitchen cupboards, so it's really cheap. And you know how much I love the word "cheap"!