But when you make your own - out of a colorful sheet, an old T-shirt or even crocheted, shredded plastic bags - you won’t just reap the karmic rewards (each reusable bag translates into 1,000 disposable bags you didn’t touch), you’ll save the cash you might have spent on a swanky, commercially made version. The British schoolteacher was so appalled by the plastic bag impact on marine wildlife - experts estimate that 100,000 marine creatures die every year after ingesting bits of plastic - she rounded up a few friends in 2007 to sew cloth shopping bags and distribute them outside supermarkets in Suffolk. Now, California’s on deck to become the first state to ban plastic bags and add a surcharge to their brethren, the lowly brown paper sack, with AB 1998, which has passed the State Assembly hurdle and heads to the Senate later this year. If you’re comfortable around a sewing machine - and know what a French seam is - you’ll find Morsman’s guerrilla bags a breeze.

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