Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Reusable produce bags

As I was working on my everlasting knitting project recently (a shopping bag featured in last year's spring issue of Interweave knits... and yes, I've been working on it for a year with a nine month break between spurts) I started thinking about resuable produce bags because I HATE all those flimsy little plastic bags floating around in my refrigerator.

So I decided to make some reusable ones. After a bit of research online of what to make it out of (sheer fabric or tulle), a bit of browsing at an antique store, and a brief wait to collect my iron from a friend that borrowed it, I made some. (I would like to note I used Wisdom of the Moon for reference, but simple bags aren't that hard to make. It's a bag.)

I made a total of 4 bags: one tall and skinny for celery, carrots, green onions and the like, one for lettuce, one for small items greens (cilantro, garlic, lemons/limes) and a large "apple" bag that actually could hold many apples, onions, potatoes, etc. As I did not have any cilantro, garlic, lemons or limes on hand, I put three apples in that bag for the photo and a gigantic sweet potato and four onions in the large apple bag.

Anyway, I allowed for seams on one side of the bag, but for some reason wasn't thinking and didn't add it to the other side of the bag... as a result, all of the bags are 2 inches shorter than I was expecting. But that's ok, they'll work. Also, two of the bags (the large apple bag and the lettuce bag) have a drawstring that needs to be added to it as soon as I figure out what type of cord I want.
I'm thinking about making more of these and putting them up on etsy. It's an idea at least.
lettuce, celery, apples, oh my!
the print
lettuce help you carry fooood
celery goodness