Painfree Way to Clean Up Milk Thistle Leaves?

I planted milk thistle for the first time this year and am quite excited by the exotic "milk stained" thistle leaves. I have read they are highly edible, you just need to trim the thorns off the leaves. But I'm thinking these are on par with prickly cactus plants, which I've just planted this year and was taught by the plant to handle it very carefully. Both are very painful to handle.

At first with the milk thistle leaves I was using a paring knife and tracing inside the outline to cut off the thorn tips. But the leaf is not flat, it is ruffled, and that makes for some trouble. However the edibility of the leave, it's quite lovely, keeps me pursuing it. So tonight I used a fine pointed cutting shear I have to cut around the leaf edges. It was better, BUT I'm still wondering if anyone out there has perfected a thorn removing method so getting at the satisfying leaf.

Viola Bluez wrote:...I'm thinking these are on par with prickly cactus plants, which I've just planted this year and was taught by the plant to handle it very carefully. Both are very painful to handle.

Hmm... I read that the Opuntia ficus-indica version of the prickly pear cactus is thornless.

http://www.new-ag.info/en/focus/focusItem.php?a=340

That would be so very cool. But a little outside of my hardiness zone 3. I'm quite enamoured with the fact a prickly pear grows here, so I'm not offended by its defences, just very cautious with it. I'm just hoping to grow enough to be able to try some for food purposes.