Plastic.....is for Credit Cards, not Produce!

OK, so how many of you are like me and actually had to train yourselves to remember to CARRY and USE your reusable bags? I mean we all purchased them with all the best intentions of putting them into use, and most of us are truly passionate about making real changes in our lives that will make a difference in the world…..but of course if you’re like me you may suffer from what I like to call “Momheimer’s disease”. It’s similar to Alzheimer’s, but it starts to happen about the time you become pregnant and I hear that there is no cure, not even after your children leave home! Truth or fiction??? Either way, that is my story and I’m sticking to it! However, I have gotten much better when it comes to the carrying and usage of my reusable bags. In fact my son usually winces only slightly these days when he sees me pop open the trunk of my car and drag out a myriad of mismatched bags from my collection. Ha! He’s come to understand that this is the way of the world, or at least the way of our household and is becoming much more comfortable when the clerks at the store give me the “stank eye” for being the one to mess up their rhythm and actually USE the bags. Oh well, it has to be someone doesn’t it.

Well, it occurred to me a few weeks back that even with all my grand intentions with my reusable bags for toting my groceries to and fro that I was still using plastic bags for my produce. It hit me that in America they do not look kindly to “loose” produce, unlike when I lived in Italy and it was not an issue. However, in Italy they looked unfavorably upon people actually touching the produce, so they provide plastic gloves for you to wear in order to pick out your produce there, but do not mind piling up loose oranges, or green beans to weigh them out. After thinking of a way to get around the plastic produce bags it hit me that I would like to have some sort of mesh bag similar to the bag I use when doing my laundry that I put my delicate “under things” in so that they do not get harmed. With that I set out to one of my favorite places, Jo-Ann Fabrics. I purchased some mesh fabric and got to work. I have added a few pictures of my mesh produce bags, so that you can all see what they look like. I made three sizes to fit the small, medium and large produce that I purchase and fitted them with a Velcro closure for easy open and closing. The sides I fashioned with some left over fabric I had from the holiday season when I went mad making aprons for the ladies in my family. I secured the sides with stitch witch and then sewed them for added strength. Therefore not only are they environmentally savvy, they are also just a little bit sassy as well, and I think we all deserve just a little bit of sassy when we’re lugging ourselves through yet another trip to the grocery store! I hope you find the bags a good tip and if anyone is interested in purchasing them please drop me a comment and I can tell you where you can go to purchase them.