Our local supermarket has new plastic bags, a lighter weight, but strong. In a transparent light green color with a teence of darker green print. The produce bags are an even paler, nearly white, green with a little darker green print… very color coordinated! But I was dinking around with them and found that cut into strips about 1/2-3/8″ wide and looped together they make a nice ribbon looking ‘yarn’. I wove this square to see what it would look and act like. It looks very pretty, I think, with a nice conservative shine sort of like the artificial raffia I once bought.
I have a fair collection of these bags and I think I’m going to get out the 12″ square and make some summer placemats for the picnic table. You can find instructions for these on the web page. http://www.hazelroselooms.com/project_files/ThankfulThanksgiving.pdf
They should be washable by hand tho I expect you won’t want to set anything too hot on them. Your color scheme will be determined by what your local store carries! But mine were pretty easy to weave, which is one thing I wondered about. Just cut the handles and the bottom seam off the bag, lay it out flat, and start folding it evenly. That way you can cut the loops easy, once you have it folded about 3″ wide. Then just loop them together and weave. I’m going to fringe mine so just keep any color change ends on opposite sides and the tails will blend right in. If you want to share pictures, I’d love to see what you get! 🙂