Thursday, January 19, 2012

Plastic Grocery Bag Bags?!?

I have discovered PLARN!!!!

plarn [plahrn]
noun
  1. plastic yarn
  2. thread made of plastic shopping bags and used for knitting and weaving.
  3. a continuous strand or thread made from plastic shopping bags
 I cannot remember where I first discovered my new obsession. But somewhere I saw something made out of plastic bags. Now my daughter-in-law really REALLY dislikes all of the plastic going to landfills. She thinks they should be outlawed. I agree that we, as a nation, send too many things to landfills. My mantra is "Never throw anything away."

Because of my daughter-in-law's thoughts, I decided to make her a plarn bag for Christmas. She liked it so much, she encouraged me to make more bags.

I looked at several videos and websites for making plarn. Some cut the bag into loops and tie them together. I tried this, but didn't like all of the knots. I prefer the continuous loop method.

I also looked at several patterns. This is the one I finally decided to try: Messenger Bag Crafted from Plastic Bags. Here are the first bags that I made.

Later I found a plarn pattern for a Plastic Fat Bottom Bag and so I made these


 
The bags take at least 10 hours to make and about 50 bags each. It has been fun, but they will be very expensive to buy.

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4 comments:

  1. hiya melanie , i am seriously impressed with these bags and your patience too thanks for sharing and i might give it a go but maybe a purse first ..lol
    happy plarn knitting
    xmaggiex

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  2. I love the fat bottom bag pattern. I agree that is does take a while to get all the yarn ready to work with, but the results are wonderful.

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  3. These are so cute! You did a great job! thank you for joining Thrifty Things Friday! Have a great weekend!

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  4. Wow, you're kidding! Those are made from plastic bags?! I'm so ridiculously impressed right now. Wowsers. Thanks a million for sharing this coolness at shine on fridays!!

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