For planting annuals, bulbs and sometimes weeding I like my mattock I found at Sears made by Craftsman. I have arthritis in both hands, and especially in my thumbs and this tool causes very little pain compared to a regular trowel.
In the spring I also love my scuffle hoe. I

My favorite one-and-onlys are my Ace Hardware Brand trowels and Bordine Nursery potting soil. The trowels are made of strong metal (besides the nice wooden handle), and are reinforced the best way trowels can be reinforced to prevent any bending or breaking. The potting soil is always very fresh, very sterile, and the best draining kind I can find. All plants will grow in it better than any other potting soil that I have tried, period. I have a few other favs, but those are my biggest. Happy gardening everyone!

-teengardener86

Fafard 52 potting soil, a bark based mix. Usually a commercial potting soil only, but available at Telly's. Great Stuff.

Winged Weeders. Best weeding tools ever made. I have bought and been given a few others but they are all useless junk in comparison.

Though I have 3 pairs of Felcos (I missplace them), I also really like the Florian ratchet pruners. They really do work well. Saw them demoed at the Philly Flower Show, and I use them all the time.

I have gotten some Razorback pruners this year from TSC. They are extremely handy and keep a good edge. They were inexpensive and on sale!! I think I paid $6 a pair and got 3 pair. I am always laying them down and temporarily misplacing them. This is the main reason I won't pay the $45 for Felcos. Afraid that would be the pair I LOST! These Razorbacks open wide enough to use my sharpeners without taking them apart, like all my other pruners. Spring is good, easy to close. So fast to sharpen them all up at once. Before I would get out the 6-8 pruner pairs and take them apart to do all at once. That is a pain. Steel is good on the Razorbacks, holds an edge well. I just like them sharp enough to shave with, so cutting is easy, So I sharpen almost every day. When I am cutting, I cut a lot. Also in the package was a spare blade for each pair. How can you go wrong with a deal like that? I also like the other Razorback tools I have picked up, like fiberglass handle shovels, round, flat, spade, long-handle garden trowel. Seem to be a good brand.
My husband bought me a JD Professional weedwhacker for doing my fence lines. With farm fence I am doing milage! It is a real step up from the old, tired one we have worn out. Easy start, very powerful. I think my favorite other tools would be my two-wheel wheelbarrow with plastic tub (NEVER tips over with a load) and a small wagon with mesh sides and air filled tires. They both carry great loads so I don't have to work hard, make my life easier. The wagon also can be clipped on behind the tractor.
I like to check out things, sometimes the better names ARE the best way to go. You save time and effort using handy, well designed products. Felcos have a lot of models, developed because people ask for them. Have you tried the rotating handle? I have always heard good stuff about Felcos. Professional workers can't waste time with tools that don't do their work well. Nobody ever has too much time to waste. Not snobby to want stuff that makes your job easier. The unknowing observer is the one who makes comments because a products appearance "LOOKS" just like that other one, but the price is WAAYYY apart. I notice my husband doesn't take out his cheap hammers when he has a big job to do! Estwing every time. Cheap is ok for a whack or two, picture hooks, breaking ice in water tanks, hanging on the fence.

I have a pair of Fiskar pruners that I really like, they fit my hand very well. I did finally buy a pair of Felcos, they are the ones with the rotating handle. I have arthritis, tendonitis and carpal tunnel, these pruners are much easier on my hand than the other's I've used.

But if I didn't have problems with my hand, I'd stick with the Fiskars.

I guess I could be called snobbish or picky about rose suppliers: I would only want gift certificates from those few own root suppliers who send large healthy plants: Roses Unlimited, Antigue Rose Emporium, Chamblees, or Amity Heritage Rose Nursery. As to the lesser rose suppliers: Once burned, twice shy... hey, life is short; I don't want to waste it waiting around for sickly twiglets to struggle to adulthood if they make it at all.

I guess I am "snobbish" about my compost pile.....it is my pride and joy of fertilizer...I'm too snobbish to buy any chemical...Others call me "dirty ole compost hugger" but the attitude is still there...I have never dug a garden either....
But my garden medium has always been a sandy loam...just moved to clay so I may have to pay someone to dig it the first time!