Turn Rice Bags into Shopping Tote Bags

Husband and I had some empty rice bags in our stash of reusable shopping tote bags. However, we rarely used them, or even worse, we got the passive aggressive stink eye from clerks at the grocery store because the rice bags were much smaller than the rest of our shopping tote bags.

I decided to make my small rice bags into larger shopping tote bags.

Shopping Tote Bag#1

I opened up the seams and removed the handles from this burlap rice bag with a seam ripper. Then I cut two 5 inch (3 inches wide + 1 inch seam allowances) rectangles out of a way too-faded-to-donate-to-charity 100% cotton curtain panel and sewed them to the sides of bag. I made and attached handles to the top of the bag for easy toting around town. I like how the green reclaimed curtain panel coordinates with the green lettering on the burlap rice bag.

The zipper is not functional. I just left it in the side of the bag so everyone knows that yes, this was once a small Basmati rice bag.

Shopping Tote Bag#2

The next rice bag was two pieces of cloth sewed together with a zipper opening on top. Again, I opened up the seams and removed the handles and zipper with a seam ripper. Then I cut a one piece rectangle out of leftover heavy muslin cloth I had in my craft stash and used it to join the top and sides of the bag together. I made black handles out of more leftover cloth from my craft stash to coordinate with the black label and sewed them to the bag.

Now I have two much larger shopping tote bags and wouldn't you know it I haven't encountered Passive Aggressive Checkout Clerk at the Mega Shopping Mart to impress her with my full compliment of shopping tote bags that are now roughly all the same size. (No wonder that I've taken to buying my grocery staples at Aldi's because the Grocery Baggers there don't care what size my shopping tote bags are because the Grocery Bagger is me.)

However, the Not Passive Aggressive But Very Hip Checkout Clerk at Trader Joe's was impressed with my shopping bag handiwork. What do you think?

In Other Blog Business

Don't forget to enter my Earthlust Stainless Steel Reusable Water Bottle Contest! You still have time to enter, the contest ends November 9th.

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This post is part of Thrify Green Thursday.