Hand care for figure skaters (or anyone who spends time in the cold)

Ok, this post is a little different to the kinds of things I usually blog about, but it's getting to that time of year where the combination of the freezing cold ice rink and my centrally-heated home, plus pulling on rough laces three times a week, is beginning to show on my poor fingers.

It's probably not just me with this problem, so I thought I'd share with you some of my favourite products.

An important thing to note is you really shouldn't use harsh scrubs or products on cracked skin, but I do as long as it's not broken to the point of bleeding. I'm not advising you from a medical/dermatological point of view, purely from skater to skater and sharing my personal favourites.

It's important all year round to look after your hands, after all, they do a lot of hard work on a daily basis. The skin on the hands and feet is thicker than other parts of the body, which is why you can get away with more when it comes to using household cleaning products etc. But in the winter (and especially in the cold rink) they need a little extra help.

1) My favourite all-round hand cream has to be Hand Food by Soap and Glory. This contains Shea Butter, Macadamia Oil and marshmallow (!) - and no, you can't eat it, as tasty as it may smell.

I use Hand Food on a daily basis. All hand creams work best just after you've washed your hands as they're designed to lock in moisture. The best time to do that is after your hands have been wet (but thoroughly dried too), because they've just absorbed water into the skin. The cream will then lock that in. This is especially true for oily products.

2) A little-known brand compared to some of the others, but (no pun intended) I love 'I Love Cosmetics' products. This strawberries and cream hand cream is particularly tasty smelling. I prefer some of the other hand creams for consistency but nothing beats the smell of this one, and it's a nice one to have on your desk at work or in your Zuca.

Because they're a smaller company, the products are really affordable too. This hand cream is only £1.99 on the I Love website. You can also get it in most Superdrugs and some branches                                                       of Boots.

3) This one's a little bit more costly but nothing beats Aquaphor for really badly cracked skin. It feels a bit oily, but with a couple of days of use (and you only need a tiny bit) it very quickly clears up your sore bits and softens everything up. This works well on conditions such as eczema and psoriasis too. Aquaphor has no smell as such as it's very mild for use on damaged or delicate skin.

4) If you've got to that point where you feel you need a scrub to work off any flaky, hard or cracked bits, Sanctuary's Ultra-refining Hand Polish is my absolute favourite thing to use. The grains in it are fine, but not so fine that you feel you're getting no scrub benefit. The polish is also incredibly soft and creamy and leaves your hands feeling absolutely gorgeous every single time. It also smells lush.

5) I adore this home-made sugar scrub from The Idea Room, both for hands and for the rest of the body. I made a batch of these as Christmas presents last year and they went down a treat. I also often make it for myself just without the essential oils - it doesn't really need to smell nice, it's just a bonus. There are a number of different variations of this scrub on http://www.theidearoom.net/ - all as lovely as each other. The Idea Room even has free printables you can use for the stickers. It's a great little blog.






6) Last but not least is one of the ingredients from the sugar scrub above - coconut oil. This is a great natural moisturiser. At room temperature, coconut oil is solid so it's really easy to scoop out a bit with fingers - just be aware it melts into oil with the heat of your hands, so rub it in before it drips all over the floor! Although it's an oil, it doesn't feel oily and is lovely to use.