Very high on my list of things I hate are those bags that you put your produce in at the grocery store. By the way, my husband and I have an ongoing fight over whether or not to put bananas into one of those bags. Um, dude, bananas have peels. A year or so ago I went super Earth Mama and made some bags for produce out of an old pair of pants, but as many many many things in my home, they went missing. And so I returned to those icky bags.
But not for long! This week the busy bees and I did a little bit for the Earth and made ourselves some new produce bags, and made them even more awesome by using fruits and veggies to decorate them. It definitely was a fun (but slightly messy) project. I’m not gonna lie, fabric paint is not easy to get out of your favorite, perfectly worn in grey tee shirt. Boooo.
To make these bags, you will need
1. 1 – 2 yards of lightweight but sturdy fabric. I got mine at Joanns in the utility fabric section.
2. Fabric paint
3. Meat trays for the paint (yay recycling!)
4. Various fruit and veggies. We used apples, pears, oranges, broccoli, celery, cucumber and carrot.
For a little educational value, I labeled two pieces of fabric “fruit” and two “veggie” so we had a little conversation about sorting and categorizing, and even talked a little nutrition.
like the blue splatters? Heres a tip – put the lid on the paint BEFORE you shake it.
How awesome does that celery stamp look? That might have to make an appearance in a later project…
After drying overnight, I whipped up some drawstring bags (there are 400 bazillion tutorials online, so I will forgo the laborious instructions) that will be perfect for produce, and will spare me from those horrid grocery store bags! And my store gives me a $.05 discount for every bag I bring myself so cha ching! I figure these will pay for themselves in, like, a year or two. Ha ha.
What baby steps have you made to make the earth a little happier this month? It doesn’t take much! Every little bit helps.
Happy Earth, um, Month!
