Saturday, October 19, 2013

Plastic Bags - The Never Ending Pile

   I'm not sure how, and I'm not sure when, but somehow I ended up with this many plastic shopping bags which I corralled from around the apartment:

This made me feel a little sick to my stomach.  While having a few on hand for trash and such is useful, there is no way that I would use up THIS many bags...ever.  What is more frustrating is that, unlike in our prior country of residence, the local recycling program does not take plastic bags (Reduce Reuse Recycle - Green Minimalism!).  So what is a green-minimalist supposed to do?!

Well luckily I have noticed that a few big chain stores like Target and Meijer have plastic shopping bag recycling programs!  I stuck these babies in my trunk and the next time I was at one of these stores I did a big drop off.  While that felt amazing I still wanted to make sure I was not in this situation ever again (or at least try my best!).  So I obtained a number of cloth reusable bags to keep in my car for future shopping trips.  Other ways to avoid plastic build up is to simply say 'no thank you' to clerks in stores if you are just buying one or two items, and of course, we can cut down on the number of shopping trips we take in any given week or month altogether! 

Do you have a shelf/bag/drawer/or corner of your house overflowing with plastic bags that you can't bear to throw away and can't seem to keep from growing?  Just follow these easy steps:

1) Find a store that has a shopping bag recycling program and take a trip to drop them off!
2) Invest in some cloth reusable bags and keep them in your car or in a convenient place for when you do go shopping.
3) Cut down on the amount of times you shop and the items themselves and you will have less bags coming into the house.

Any other tips or tricks out there?! You know I love hearing from you! Please share in the comments!

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