When buying garden tools make sure to spend the extra money and buy well made preferably forged steel.  The tool will last you a long time.  Most store bought tools are cheap, poorly made and will break, bend or fall apart when used.  My favorite place to get tools is at the best garden center in the entire Philadelphia Tri-State region - Terrain at Styers.  Well made hand forged tools are a bit pricey but well worth it. What was the best garden center was bought by the owners of Anthropologie who gave it a do-over turning it into a complete magical experience.  It is located in Concordville PA on the corner of Rt 1 and Rt 322.  Go and spend an afternoon there, have lunch, shop in the home store, buy all of their top quality stock of plants, pick up planters, fountains, everything that you need for the home landscape except the person to install everything that you couldn't live without.  They'll do that too for a fee, so will I.  My latest want is a hosta called Fire Island.  It is an offshoot of the Red October hosta but has yellow leaves instead of green but has the same red petioles.  It is just stunning.  None are in at the moment but one is on display in one of their many beautifully planted containers.  - off to Ferret Hollow.

The tools that I use most of the time are a forged steel trowel, a  Japanese Hori Hori Weeder Knife, a three pronged cultivator claw, good leather gloves, and of course good knee pads.  Also a good idea to be wearing glasses or sunglasses for eye protection.  You never know when one of the branches are going to make a bee line to your eye when you are least expecting it.