PlasticPoetry 2

An army of plastic bags
has begun the long polymer
procession to your doorstep.
And when those specimens
of infinite plastic perfection
arrive, you’ll have to answer
for your unasnwering.

EveryDayUsesofPlasticBags #1

We can get all artistic about plastic bags, but sometimes you just gotta clean up dog poop.

Today’s EveryDayUsesofPlasticBags is easy, practical and once you start it, you’ll do it everytime: PlasticBagging your shoes when traveling.

We’ve all traveled with an extra pair of dirty shoes or sandals. We needed them for hiking, or canoeing or something. And the shoes got covered in mud, or poop, or something less colorful than our copious supply of plastic bags.

Right Chaco in the Pink, Left Chaco in the Purple

Following a recent trip to the City of David water tunnel, my Chacos had more than their share of wet crud. It was cold, and leaving the tunnel,  I took my New Balances out of some PlasticBags and replaced them with my Chacos. And then I tied up the PlasticBags. For convenience, the shoes were put in different colored bags.

PlasticBags ShoeWrappers: The Solution is really that simple.

PlasticPoetry 1

Plastic whispers as wind blows through a torn bag on the side of the only road in the desert. Everyone drives by this bush with a plastic bag, but no one notices. It whispers: I am forever.

PlasticBag GiftWrap!

By now we know we can do so much more with plasticbags, almost anything: the laundry, be the life of the party, provide enough back and neck support–and of course, carry the groceries. While all the previous uses were plasticly practical, ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags also focuses us on the abstract and aesthetic uses for plastic bags. While we want dry laundry, We also  want to take advantage of all the different colors available in plasticbaggery– just for the beauty and color themselves.

When it came time to wrap up a silkscreen painting as a wedding gift, we turned to plasticbags as the source of creativity. Micah Rosenblatt took plastic bags–some of which had already been used for groceries, purim costumes, plasticbagpillows. Now, micah was breaking them into smaller pieces. No scissors–Micah just gently stretched the polymer apart into quadilaterals of different variations.

PlasticBagPieces

One large piece-a plasticbag ripped down the side and opened flat-was stretched from behind to the front,

Pictured, from right: painting of the Arizal's Shul, 1 large plasticbagpiece and many smaller plasticbagpieces

where various colored plasticbag quadirilateral scraps were thoughtfully arranged atop an artist’s rendition of the Arizal’s shul in Tzfat. Tearing plasticbags apart into different pieces always leaves dangling edges on larger pieces to which Josh and Micah tied smaller plasticbagpieces.

Authentic PlasticBagCraftsmanship in the heart of Jerusalem

The giftwrapping itself was so ecsquisite that it would have looked just as  beautiful on our friends’ wall.

Many of the plastic bags used to wrap the painting we recycled twice since they originally carried groceries-as Josh’s Purim costume and our guests’ pillows and now we have a forth use for these plasticbags.

Such Artistry requires tightknots and brightly colored plasticbags

Although the shraps of polymer packaging won’t likely be recycled for a fifth use, reusing plasticbags three times was well worth the creative energy. Not only can plasticbags be practical, they can beautiful and thoughtful as well.

Mazel Tov to Leo and Keshet-and Mazel Tov ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags.

EcoFriendly Wedding Gifts are not edible.

PlasticBag Pajama Party

Party is a word we regularly couple with PlasticBags. When you’ve got a kitchen cabinet filled with PlasticBags, why not party-even when you’re in your pajamas? Dispite the pressure to start a clothingline which may include PlasticBagPajamas, we have innovated a new polymerbased sleepover.

Friends of ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags also love to save money and recycle plastic bags. Following Purim, We celebrated our friend Leo’s wedding at our worldheadquaters. When we decided to call it a night, we had enough blankets and sleeping space for our friends-but not enough pillows.

PlasticBagPillow

Purim Costumes were quickly disassembled and recycled, as well as bags from under the sink, collective filling a single plastic bag to serve as a pillowcase. The bags weren’t folded or rolled up anyway when stuffed into the pillowcase-different colored, as well as different sized bags were used. Keeping our guests’ comfort and goodnightsleepingness at a maximum,  ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags uses nothing less 10-12 plasticbags to fill each plasticbagpillow.

"I just want to laugh this pillow is so comfortable" Micah Rosenblatt, PlasticBagAdvocate

Despite numerous request otherwise, ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags is not actually a Bed and Breakfast. And our facilities are rated 5star,but we’re not a hotel-we’re just guys looking formoreusesofplasticbags. Our commitment is to our values: service, colorfulness, environmentally consciousness-as well, our commitment is for more uses of plastic bags

ForMoreUsesofPlasticBagZZzzzzzz

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Refurbish Your Drying Rack: Minor Assembly Required

Of the many things that came with my Nachlaot Apartment–including a bunch of nature photos, a television, and a sticker which reads “Baby Unterwegs”–we got an incomplete drying rack. Incomplete in that its frame was intact but that the long bars for hanging clothes were missing.

Our Landlord's Mother's Washing Machine and our incomplete drying rack

Originally we did our clothes washing up the street. But with great blessing our Breslov landlord gave us his mother’s washing machine. At first, we found ourselves SOL with soggy clothes, until…Yes, you guessed it, we made a solution with plastic bags.

The plan was incredibly simple: Roll a bunch of bags width wise, tie them together into a rope, tie both ends of the rope to the drying rack, and dry our wet clothes.

ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags will gladly walk you through the steps

Joshua Rolling plastic Bags

Step One: Roll up a bunch of bags so the handles are at one end and the bottom of the bag is at the other. Try to get out as much air from the bags as possible, but don’t stress if there are some bubbles here and there.

Step Two: Tie them together into a rope. This is where the magic happens- Both ends of the bag will be used, just tie the bags together. Joshua recommends making the knots incredibly tight. YouTube MoreUsesofPlasticBags to see how Joshua tie bags together. We recommend having a friend play guitar in the background to set the mood.

Me Tying PlasticBagRope to Drying Rack Frame

Step Three: Tie Both ends of the plastic bag rope to the drying rack. Wrap one end of the plasticbagrope around the drying rack once and then tie a knot. Stretch out the rope, make sure it’s long enough and then tie the other end of the rope to the other side of the frame. While our drying rack originally had 6 long bars for hanging clothes, Josh and I made 4 Plastic Bag Ropes and found it more than adequate for our clothes-drying needs.

Josh Tying PlasticBagRope to Drying Rack

Step Four: Dry your clothes. This requires either washing your clothes or getting them wet, and dry air (cold or hot). The Plastic Bags are incredibly strong and can hold all your clothes. Don’t overlap wet clothing or it will not dry properly.

Enjoy!

Step Four

Plastic Purim

The Jewish Holiday of Purim was observed this week to commemorate the deliverence of the Jewish People in the Persian Empire of Haman’s plot to destroy them. Jews worldwide from Austin, Tx to Jerusalem joyfully celebrated through various observances and innovative expressions. Of the many rabbinnically ordained and cultural observances- giving gift baskets, drinking and joyfullness–masquerading has been part of the Purim experience. In Jerusalem, the Jewish Spiritual Capital and the ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags headquarters, many costumes were very unusual and increadibly original. And some, were very eco-friendly.
This year, ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags co-founder, Joshua Fleet made his costume entirely of plastic bags.

Josh’s costume design was simple. A few bags-leafs-tied to the arms, and about 5 plastic bag filled bags linked together atop the head as flower petals. This colorful, ecofriendly costume incurred no additional costs.

The Plastic Plunge

Living next to the Largest Shuk (open air market) in Jerusalem assures a constant supply of fresh produce and delicious foods in my apartment. However, no matter what we get-a few bottles of wine, half-priced day-old bread, a multicolored rug or a bunch of fresh jaffa oranges-without even asking, our vendor has gladly put everything in a Sakit (plastic bag) before I get back 2 and 1/2 shekles change.

My roommate, Josh, and I started saving our bags without saying anything to eachother. We keep them under the kitchen counter next to the spare toilet paper. About two months in Jerusalem and We’ve accumulated all colors of plastic bags: orange, red, black, clear, whitish-clear, white, yellow, green- you name it, we’ve got it.

We all know that plastic bags are an environmental issue. We keep making more of them and just throwing them away, or worse throwing them out the window. To keep things simple and save money we’ve been reusing our plastic bags as trashbags for the two wastebaskets that the previous tenent left in our lovely basement apartment.

As life happens and our wallets get smaller, we’ve realized that we can (and usually need to) use these plastic bags for much more. Our first creative insight came when we were cleaning up all these electronics we inherited from the previous tenet and we needed a way to wrap up about 15 feet of coaxial cables. We were standing next to the kitchen counter and BAM! We took out a black plastic bag, wound up the cable and then tied it with our trusty recycled bag. After we tied it up, we staged a few pictures and resolved to launch this blog.

We were inspired to do more, and knew that there had to be at least four other ways to reuse plastic bags. ForMoreUsesofPlasticBags.Wordpress.Com has been launched to catalogue innovative ways to reuse plastic bags beyond the regular recycling repetoire, stimulate environmental awarness wherever plastic bags are to be found, and to just have fun with excess consumer conveniences.

Onward! Our first project will be revamping our drying rack

Our rickety old drying rack is missing more than a few pieces. Our solution: Plastic Bags.