How to Store Plastic Grocery Bags

As the new year begins it’s time to finally tackle some of my less than par organizational skills. For the most part I would call myself a “clean” person. Our house is normally only about a 10 minute speed clean away from being “guest ready” and I tend to run the dishwasher an adequate amount of times during the week. I have to admit though, I am not exactly what you would call organized.

I don’t make lists.
I have a calendar hanging on the wall…it is currently turned to November 2013.
I lose my phone more times in a day than I can count.
I can’t remember important dates (or the actual day’s date for that matter!)

It’s bad over here guys. So I guess you could say I need any help I can get! I’m working through those mentioned flaws, but for now let’s start with organizing my plastic bags. Baby steps my friends…

So here was my current bag situation. I’d like to say this was the worst of it, but honestly as I was pulling these out of the closet I found about six more bags shoved between the wall and cabinet. So many bags…where do they all come from? And why do I keep leaving my reusable bags at home on grocery days? And why do all my bags have little red targets all over them? (This year I vow to shop less at Target! –We’ll see how long that lasts…)

Anyway, a friend of mine taught me this simple method to store my bags almost a year ago and I am finally getting around to storing them this way! It is simple, fast and saves so much space!

When I showed Tanner how to do it, he said “That’s great, but all of those bags are not going to fit in your jar.” And you know what? He was wrong. They fit! A little organization can go a long way when it comes to saving space. Who knew!

Here’s a photo play by play for all you visual folk out there (like myself!)

1. Hold your bag by the handles and draw your hand down the bag to squeeze the air out.
2. Grab the end of the bag with one hand and wrap the bag around two of your fingers.
3. Continue to wrap the bag around your fingers, the handles should twist around your hand as well.
4. As you reach the end of your bag a loop should form with the handles.
5. Take your loop and wrap it around the bag.
6. That’s it!