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Your mission, if you choose to accept, is to reduce your consumption of plastic bags.
Level of Commitment: Baby Steps
This is the third plastics Monday Mission. Please review the first two here:
I waffle back and forth on my diligence with creating waste. It definitely takes more time and effort to NOT throw things away that are deemed disposable by most of the culture. You either have to organize your home differently, with recycling containers right next to the wastebasket, or you have to take extra steps, like running the empty cans out to the garage instead of just tossing them in the under-the-sink garbage can. Sometimes you even have to clean a container first before recycling or reusing it, expending time and energy, and raising the question of how much water and energy it takes to wash a plastic bag versus just throwing it away.
Deciding what to do with each individual piece of “waste” isn’t always easy, but I have to trust that God honors the steps I take, even if they don’t end up making a positive physical impact on our world. Sometimes I literally don’t have the energy/time/space to set a plastic bag aside to repurpose/reuse/recycle it. Sometimes I’m just a lazy, corner-cutting slacker. (Be sure to read the Food for Thought to learn why we don’t want to generate plastic bag waste.)
Don’t Let a Plastic Bag be a One-Hit Wonder
When I’m on top of my game, however, I try to figure out a way to reuse every plastic bag I come across.
It’s easier with a baby in diapers, because the diaper bag needs to be stocked with “waste” bags. Here’s what I had in there today:
You’ll see a few produce bags, a hot dog bun bag, and a flour bag. I often have the thin sleeve from the newspaper delivery in there, too. They’re used to capture dirty diapers for the travel to the garbage or to contain soiled clothing in case of newborn blowouts. Sometimes you just have to have something disposable! We also find that produce bags are just right to line the diaper wastebucket, since it needs to be emptied so frequently. Would it create less waste to use cloth diapers? Of course, and I still wish I had gotten on that boat when Lovey Girl was born, but it’s a bit too late now to be economical, so…you do what you can.
Added Bonus: This of course saves us money that we don’t spend on fancy smell-controlling diaper baggies for travel or Genie inserts.
Here are other ideas to reuse or repurpose plastic bags in your life:
- The standard: wash and reuse Ziplocs
- (Got a small hole in one? Either recycle it if possible in your area (many don’t do no. 4) or use it to keep small toys, puzzles or items in a purse organized.)
- My favorite new one: use cereal bag inserts to pound meat or shake on topping (like for chicken nuggets)
- Reuse all sandwich bags and Ziplocs for dry foods as many times as you can…without washing or throwing away. I have the same granola bar baggie in my lunchbox for a long time, and I’ll put things like crackers or biscuits in the same bag “to go” as often as possible.
Timesaver: When my husband was in the habit of taking oatmeal to work for breakfast, he had 5 zippered sandwich bags that he always brought home and put in a container in the pantry. When all were empty, he would fill them with the ½ cup of oatmeal and they were conveniently grabbable in the morning. Do the same with kids’ lunchboxes whenever possible! - Use a bread bag to freeze individual biscuits, muffins, pancakes, etc.
- Don’t buy small garbage can liners; just use a grocery bag like this:
- My husband, the fashionista, always carries his lunch in a grocery bag.
- Capture messy stuff like chicken bones from stock or waste from cutting a melon in a bag before you throw it away.
- Use plastic bags to cushion gifts and packages in the mail instead of packing peanuts or tissue paper.
- Make a purse or other craft like this:
Photo by Oh My Stinkin’ Heck - Search the Internet for more crafts.
- “Upcycle” your wrappers. You must check out Terracycle, a company that reuses or makes new products out of wrappers (like potato chip bags, granola bar wrappers or juice drink pouches). So cool! Last year they collected over 100 million packaging items that would otherwise have been in landfills. Your school or group can actually participate in this as a fundraiser. Read an informative interview with the CEO here.
Better Yet: No New Plastic Bags
While making sure that any plastic bag in your life is used at least twice before being tossed, an even nobler goal is to avoid bringing new plastic bags into your home altogether. I’m thrilled to see the reusable grocery bag thing becoming so popular lately. It’s like the whole world just realized that stores don’t have to give out new bags every time someone makes a purchase. Here are other ways to avoid being a plastic bag consumer:
- Make a system for your reusable bags: where will you put them when they’re empty to make sure they get into your vehicle? How will you remember to take them from your vehicle into the store?
- If you forget your reusables, at least choose the more easily recyclable paper bags over plastic.
- If you refuse to use reusables, at least don’t be crazy and put your milk in a bag and such like that. (Personal pet peeve!) Try to use as few bags as possible without spilling your groceries all over the parking lot.
- If you are thinking of storing some food in a zippered bag, try using something that can go in the dishwasher instead. (Glass containers are marvelous!)
- Don’t use bags for things that could go in envelopes.
- Aim to buy in bulk - bigger bags, but much fewer of them!
- Hard to avoid the bread bags and such…unless you’re ready to consider making your own bread or tortillas…
- My latest change of habit: I just read a tip today about bringing your own produce bags to reuse at the grocery store. I’ve been bringing cloth bags or reusing paper bags for years at the checkout, but I never thought of bringing my own produce bags. For dry items that aren’t going to make a slimy mess in the bag, what a great idea. Isn’t it funny the simple, simple things we just gloss over because we’re not being cognizant of every action? That’s my new goal for plastic bag reduction. What’s yours?
I’ll visit your inbox – no plastic bag needed! Sign up for an email subscription or grab my reader feed.
If you missed the last Monday Mission, click here.
Some old Monday Missions:
- Get Rid of Triclosan
- Throw Away Less Food
- Using Your Dishwasher Wisely
- Connected Meal Planning
- Safe Drinking Containers
I’m joining up with Ann Kroeker for Make-Do Monday. Visit for more ideas to use what you have and repurpose items. Also see We are THAT Family for Works for Me Wednesday.
Hungry for more? Related posts:
Good one! This is something I do and can be encouraged to do more of! I must make one correction, though. It is NEVER too late to start with cloth diapers. I started our little girl when she was about six months old, and she wore them until potty trained at two! One of the best decisions I ever made, and I loved using them with our little boy as a newborn!
Jenny’s last blog post..BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS!
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Katie Reply:
July 14th, 2009 at 12:00 am
I just meant the up-front cost vs. the amount of time she’d be wearing them…and if God doesn’t have another child in mind for us, we could end up spending more on cloth vs. disposable, plus the whole learning curve of getting used to washing them. I don’t know if I love the earth THAT much!
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Great mission, great way(s) to make-do!!
Ann Kroeker’s last blog post..Make-Do Mondays: Make-Do Mousepad
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Make-Do Mondays: Make-Do Mousepad « // Jul 13, 2009 at 7:05 pm
[...] Kitchen Stewardship (reusing plastic bags–all of them!) [...]
great ideas in this post thanks so much
angie’s last blog post..Monday Muse
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What a great reminder to use less waste – I’m terrible about taking advantage of that convenience and love your ideas!
Kelly
Kelly the Kitchen Kop’s last blog post..Healthy Ingredients and Which Ones Make Me Squirm – Rookie Tip
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Great reminders and wonderful ideas on how to reduce ones use of plastic bags or what to do with them once you got them. I love crafting with the plastic bags and if you crochet, come over and check out my free pattern and green crafting ideas.
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I think I try to do most of these myself!
But this time around for our youngest we switched to cloth diapers. I’m so glad we did as I learned it takes 250-500 years for a throwaway to breakdown.. and thats only in idea conditions which the landfills are not!
For our oldest we used throwaway diapers.
Also, my husband actually started reusing the plastic produce bags a few months ago and recently we made a few of our own produce bags from an indoor “net-like” door we didn’t use!
I also try to reuse freezer bags as many times as possible before throwing them out. I first try to use our glass anchorware first though.. but sometimes we just don’t have enough of those for all the stuff I freeze! lol
Also, there is a church group I believe that uses those milk bags to make mats for people in Haiti which they use to sleep on. You can search Milk Bag Project.
Great tips!
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