I'm crocheting the bags from under my sink into a tote bag.

Apytele@sh.itjust.works to pics@lemmy.world – 57 points –
28

Okay, I cannot be the only person who saw a cat in the bag before realizing it was more bags?

i wouldnt have noticed it isnt a cat without your comment.

Most people only bring one or two bags to the shops with them. Looks like you're bringing double digits of bags lol

Yummy microplastics!

Your new bag of bags will be made from your bag of bags. You've reached peak Midwestern.

Well they're still macroplastics for now. I'm delaying their conversion into microplastics by about 5-10 years in a way that will prevent the need for more of them.

I was kind of joking, but plastic bags create microplastics and nanoplastics through photo-degradation and manipulation. Unfortunately, stretching, tearing, cutting, and twisting plastic bags create both micro- and nano-plastics. So you're definitely creating them now, not in 5-10 years.

Avoiding microplastics is basically impossible though, so I wouldn't stress it. You should look up how much magic eraser sponges create. It was actually so crazy I decided not to use them again, even if avoiding microplastics is not realistic.

This will prevent you from using plastic bags ever again?? That's the real value. Nice job!

Probably not ever, but hopefully enough that their accumulation doesn't outpace their use picking up dogshit.

If only I didn't have a dozen tote bags already. At any rate, the plastic bags around here all get used for disposal of pet waste. Fun project though. My kid is into crocheting and made a sort of rug out of them once.

We haven't been using them for pet waste at the rate they've been accumulating for quite some time now, so they had really built up. I'm hoping that making him a grocery shopping tote will also help them accumulate less quickly.

Love seeing this kinda thing on lemmy nice change from posting links

Always though about learning to crochet and this gets my attention. Where do I begin?

There's a couple different ways to make the plarn but this is super simple, all you need is scissors, and you can do it as you go. That said, I would follow a single-crochet tutorial online with some kind of string even like a shoelace or something first because I found the plarn somewhat difficult to work with at first and it would've been much harder if I didn't already have that basic stitch down.

I mentioned this on another sub but they were super displeased that I interrupted their extremely important political discourse about politicians and political parties memeing at each other. I suspect they may have also been upset that I was referencing activities they have difficulty engaging in; upcycling being only one example.

Smart.

Question, would this make it take longer to decompose? Because it's all tied together instead of seperate?

Awesome bag either way

A thousand-and-one years vs a thousand I would think.

The micro plastics will probably last a couple hundred years but the plastic shopping bag as a recognizable object will typically disintegrate within 5-10 years. It may last a bit longer being crocheted like that, assuming a good portion is protected from UV light.

Yeah the real eco friendly aspect is it lasting longer than and upcycling the existing already used plastic bags and actually used to prevent more from accumulating; I'm trying to make something that can be taken to the grocery store instead of getting more bags.

How many bags do you think it will take the complete?

Idk but I'm part of a makerspace and I bet at least a few of them also have some bags they feel too bad to throw away.