Reusable bags make awesome holiday gifts. You can stuff them with candy treats or cookies, and this is a gift that can be, and actually will be used for years and years. You can help your friends and family stay green or go green with a great bag.
I found some really nice reusable bag options – pretty ones that would make great gifts this year…

Wild Flowers Organic Cotton Eco Lunch Bag from Art And Philanthropy

If you’ve got a bunch of bubble wrap laying around, it’s better for more than popping fun.
You can also use it to protect produce, both at home and on the go. If you place a layer of bubble wrap in your produce drawers it will stop produce from hitting the hard bottom and bruising.  Same goes for snacks on the go. Most lunch sacks don’t have much cushion. If you layer the bottom with bubble wrap, even a good swing will do your apples no harm.
Of course this is just one way to reuse old bubble wrap – what other …read more

I don’t buy plastic bags. To me they’re a total waste of energy and plastic, when frankly, containers work just as well, but can be reused for years.
You do hear stories of thrifty folks using their baggies for years and years, but seriously, some get tossed, and they do develop holes. A better plan is to own a decent amount of containers with lids. That said, if you currently haven’t made that leap, and you do own some plastic bags, do try to wash and reuse them. If you feel odd about washing and reusing them for food items, there’s …read more

Our month-long June theme was the hefty topic of reusable shopping bags. We blogged and blogged bags, and yet there’s so much more we could have blogged. Bags are a big deal. We’ll likely revisit this feature at some point. If you missed any bag goodness, here’s a round-up of all things reusable bags…
The BYOB challenge:

The challenge kicks off
First BYOB challenge update
BYOB Challenge Update!!!
CHANGE: A Summer Surprise Contest
Reusable Bag Challenge Update – How Did Your Entire Month Go?

Reusable bag basics and overcoming issues:

How Many Reusable Bags Do You Need?
Overcoming Reusable Bag Shyness
Pros and Cons of String Market Bags
Reusable …read more

This month we’ve all been working hard on the reusable bag challenge. Now is your chance to tell us how you did.
Myself: I did pretty good. I only ended up with the one lame video store bag. Thankfully, I averted some clerks during the month, who were trying little sneaks, like re bagging my fruit into plastic. One bag is not so bad. I worked really hard to take my bags with me everywhere. I basically always kept them in the car, which worked well for pet store trips, and other quick stops.
Now, how did you do? Also, look for …read more

If you weren’t already using your own shopping totes before, I hope reusable bag month has helped to convert you. Now, how do you go about spreading the reusable bag love?
Try these simple ways to help your friend get the reusable bag habit on:

• Show your bags. Brag on them. Talk about how much better you like them than one-timers.
• Buy bag starter gifts. Get them started with an affordable shopping bag.
• Go shopping! For encouragement, offer to shop with your friends on their first reusable bag outings.
• Get them thinking. Ask, “How many plastic bags …read more

Bag month has been a little hectic. Too bad, because there’s just oh so many bags to see. In any case, I’m going to try and fit in a few more bags before we kick off out cool July theme.
I saw these bags originally at Eco Friendly Driver, and fell in love, because Hil had posted the light olive green darling carry bag – I’m a sucker for light olive green bags. I wanted to post it here, forgot, and then one of the store owners emailed me with some info.
Stephanie, co-business owner of Olive Smart notes the following about …read more

Inexpensive is relative; one person’s inexpensive is another person’s not so much. However, for the sake of this post, I’m naming right around $10 and under as a decent inexpensive bag. Yeah you can get store brand non-washable bags for 99 cents, but I’m more on the fence of folks buying a decent washable set. One, you can wash them. Two, they hold up better (in my experience). Three; and I’ve noted this before, but research shows that not everyone recycles those store brand bags.
So some inexpensive choices:

[Biome Lifestyle’s reusable bag – £6.00 – only downside is that this one …read more

Check out these adorable reusable lunch sacks – just one more option for cutting your bag use. I’m thinking you could even make these bigger and work out some sort of handle. A crafty sewer (read not me) could do that. The only downside is that you can’t machine wash these, but wiping down is perfectly ok.

Snag the directions right here.
Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes, and green challenges going on at Tree Hugging Family in June 2008[images via Martha Stewart]

This bag!
In wildly expensive bag news (Julie will love this one) I present you with this adorable, but WAY too expensive bag option…
The “Think Green” Organic Cotton Kermit Tote:

Pros:

Totally adorable
Organic
Comes with buttons – if you’re into that sort of thing.
It saves plastic bags

Con:
Um, almost $40 PLUS $8 shipping, for anything, even a hand spun by the queen, organic bag, is frankly, INSANE. I’m sorry, but here’s the deal; if people really want to make a difference and create change, they’re going to need to make nice organic items accessible to all of us, not just rock stars and others with …read more