When people ask me what is the one piece of crafting equipment I couldn’t do without, I tell them their are 2 things. The first is a very sharp… razor sharp… pair of scissors. That’s pretty straight forward. The second item is a little more unconventional 🙂

Everyone can understand the importance of a good pair of scissors, but it might surprise you to hear what I consider to be the other essential thing in crafting supplies. Several years ago I went to this quaint yarn shop in the garage of an elderly woman. She was definitely “off grid”. I heard about her from my sister-in-law. Louise had a small house, on a small dirt road, with a small sign hand painted sign in her yard announcing the shop. To enter the shop you sauntered up the front walk, knocked on the door (the sign on her door asks you NOT to ring her doorbell ‘cuz it makes the cats go crazy’), and waited for Louise to answer. When she did open the door the first time I went there, she was wearing a striking muumuu and oversized men’s slippers. (True story.) She told me to meet her at the side door.

When she opened the shop’s door (the service door to her garage) I felt like Dorothy entering Oz! From floor to ceiling in shelves on the walls and on (and under) an assortment of mismatched tables, was an array of beautiful yarns that rivaled the nicest yarn shops I have ever been in. When I asked her where she got her yarn, her answer was “here and there”. As I rooted through the yarns, I marveled at the assortment of beautiful wool yarns. “Unfortunately, I can’t knit with wools. I’m allergic and it destroys my hands.”

“Oh, child, do I have something for you”. And with a twinkle in her eyes (really… there was actual twinklage!), she introduced me to a product that changed my life… Gloves In A Bottle.

 

 

She explained that by rubbing this into your skin, you created a barrier between your skin and the wool, so it wouldn’t bother my skin. When I seemed a bit skeptic, she STRONGLY encouraged me, so I bought a bottle, along with some wool yarn. I tried it, fell in love, and not only use it when working with wool (yarn and felt) but always. It’s actually gotten rid of the eczema on my hands!

So here’s the skinny on Gloves in a Bottle. Not only was I able to knit with wool (I rubbed it into my hands and my wrists), I found I was using it before I cleaned bathrooms, when I went into the garden, or for any wet or irritating tasks. Finally, I started using it as I would handcream. After a lifetime of dried and cracked hands, my hands are now soft and crack free. I do not use hand lotion anymore, which often burned my sensitive skin. Rather, I use a SMALL dab of Gloves In A Bottle a couple times a day… more if I’m doing particularly skin challenging tasks. It works like MAGIC for me. How does it work? (From the back of the bottle…)

“Conventional lotions only attempt to replace natural moisture with artificial moisture. The problem is they come woof when you was or touch something. In order for moisture to really do any good it needs to get below the second major layer of skin; only your natural moisture is going to reach that level. Unlike conventional lotions, Gloves In A Bottle will not wash off and helps keep out the moisture-robbing irritants while helping to retain natural moisture, resulting in smoother skin that is not dry. It comes off naturally with exfoliated skin cells.”