Nov 4, 2009
‘Bag Lady’ crochets tote bags out of used plasticBy Shawn LinenbergerBasehorInfo.com

Karen Parrett is taking used plastic bags and turning them into — plastic bags.

The rural Tonganoxie resident said she recycles plastic bags and crochets them together to make larger bags that can be used again and again — just as canvass bags are used to hold groceries and other items.

“I don’t like to use any new ones,” Parrett said. “That’s not the purpose of the recycle.”

Friends, family and co-workers give Parrett their plastic grocery and newspaper bags to use for her bag projects.

Parrett cuts the bags widthwise into pieces, which look like mammoth rubber bands. She cuts thinner bags into two-inch strips and thicker bags into smaller strips.

Then, with a crochet hook, she takes those pieces and transforms them into plastic tote bags.

Parrett said she learned about making the tote bags while reading a magazine from her family’s insurance company. Inside was a how-to story about making the bags, complete with pattern information.

She has been crocheting the bags for about a year, though she has done various crochet work for about 25 to 30 years.

Afghans, kitchen curtains and potholders are some of the things Parrett has crocheted, or “old-lady stuff,” she said with a laugh.

Though she takes joy in her new hobby of plastic bag crocheting, it is met with some good-natured ribbing from her family when she works on bags while they are watching television.

“It’s a lot more noisy than yarn,” Karen’s husband, Doug, said.

Parrett has finished about 30 tote bags and has done specialty bags for people, a small Halloween trick-or-treat bag and a Mary Kay bag, for examples. The trick-or-treat bag was made with orange newspaper bags and black trash bags. For the Mary Kay bag, Parrett incorporated pink plastic bags into the pattern equation.

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