The Plastic Bag Dilemma

If there is one thing that I have abused over and over again, its the plastic bag. Most of the plastic I use comes from plastic grocery bags and sandwich bags. Up until now, It has been second nature for me to use a plastic bag once and then toss it, because after all, thats what its there for. They are one time use items. Most plastic bags are used for no more than a few hours, sometimes even a few minutes, and then just thrown out. And sadly enough almost all plastic bags go straight to landfill, are almost never recycled, and extremely wasteful! Like I had mention in a previous post, most members of modern society have a house full of plastic with the majority of plastic coming from food items that will soon be disposed of within the week, only to be replaced by even more plastic. This is a biiig no-no. I know that I dont want to continue being wasteful and need to take my plastic usage seriously. 

As I have been continuing on my journey to become plastic free, I have found many amazingly easy alternatives to our everyday plastic usage. Yay! They are really sooo simple, anyone can make these changes... So I would like to share with you just a few small, but vital tips on going Plastic- Bag-Free!

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Plastic Problem: Disposable Plastic Bags. Not-eco friendly, non-biodegradable, super wasteful. (nearly 1 trillion a day are thrown out worldwide)
Alternative: Canvas Bags. They are cheap, and can be really nice-looking, too.
Where to buy: Here or at most Health food stores.

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Plastic Problem: Plastic Sandwich Bags. Just like their big brother, they are non-biodegradable and hazard to the environment. These bags are also filled with nasty chemicals that can get into your food.
Alternative: Cheap, reusable, PVC-, BPA-, phthalate-, latex- and lead-free sandwich bags, which means healthy for you and healthy for the planet. High five!
Where to Buy: Here or Here

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Plastic Problem: Food Containers; full of chemicals that leach into food. If the container has any grease or food particles at all, it can damage the material meant to be recycled and contaminate the entire batch of recyclables (meaning not only does the container not get recycled, but everything in the bag is considered useless garbage!)
Alternative: Stainless Steel Air tight containers; leak proof, recyclable, BPA free.
Where to buy: Here

If you have anything that you would like to see an alternative for, leave me a comment and I'll make a special blog post about it!


-Julianne xo