Totally Tracie: Top Five Gardening Tips [Video]

I love this time of year.  Cleaning up the flower beds, digging in the soil, and putting in fresh mulch.  What I don't love is how dirt gets in my nails even when I wear gloves.  I don't know how I do it, but I always manage (again, even with gloves on) to have dirt packed in my nails and all around my cuticle.  So, yesterday afternoon, as I was scrubbing my nails and trimming them back to get all of the dirt out, I decided to to find the solution to this problem.  Here is what I found as well as some other helpful tips:

• Before you go out and start gardening, drag your fingernails across a bar of soap.  The soap will buildup under your nails creating a barrier to keep dirt out.  Just add water for a quick clean up.
• Hands getting stained from mulch or outdoor work?  Add salt to soap when washing up.  It helps scrubs away the dirt and helps remove stains.
• Ever put your garden tools down and them can't find them?  Paint the handles with fun, bright colors.  They will stand out for easy retrieval.
• Pruning rose bushes can be very prickly.  Use a clothespin to grab on the stem for prick free cutting.
• Slugs giving you problems? This is a new trick that I plan on trying this year.  Slice up cucumbers and place in tin pie pans.  The odor is supposed to repel slugs and not be noticeable to us.

Now some of you may still be asking, "How does she gets so much dirt in her nails if she is wearing gloves?"  Well, I'm still asking, too.  Part of the problem may be that I am wearing cloth gloves and not leather.  Either way, I end up taking them off half way through.  Oh, that is probably why I.....