While evaluating my eating habits in terms of waste, I began to ponder what my society and I actually eat our food from / out of. Many of us may eat our food in ziploc bags or put our meals inside of sacks or plastic grocery bags. Think about what happens to those ziploc bags we use in our lunch or the plastic grocery bags - they get thrown away after one use. In fact, 90% of all the 3,960,000 tons of plastic bags, sack and wraps produced annually are discarded (Environmental Protective Agency). All of this plastic waste is a problem - too many of them get into the ocean and harm the marine life. There are an estimated 46,000 plastic bags floating in an average square mile of ocean (according to the UN Environmental Programme). Also, it can take up to 500 years for plastics to photodegrade, which means they break down into smaller fragments that readily absorb toxins. You can read more about plastic bag wastes here: http://www.reuseit.com/facts-and-myths/ … ndemic.htm

So, what can you do to help our Earth and it's marine animals? Fi rst, take great care in reducing your purchase and use of plastic bags you know you won't reuse many times, or you know you won't bother to recycle. Don't accumulate plastic grocery bags, instead, use durable, reusable grocery bags and invest in a long-lasting lunch bag. You can buy wipable, lined, cloth bags for your sandwiches and snacks or opt for more structured, hard plastic containers such as the ones shown on this page -  http://coolmompicks.com/blog/2014/05/28 … -for-kids/ .
And there are solutions for all the plastic bags you may already have around or happen to get in the future... don't trash them just yet! One option is washing them and reusing your ziplocs. To dry them, you can simply air dry your bags on the top rack of your dishwasher. Additionally, though you can't just throw your plastic bags in the recycling bin, you can easily recycle them at many grocery stores. Find a center near you with this link! http://www.plasticfilmrecycling.org/

I love all of the specific ways you included on reusing and recycling plastic food containers. My family always uses reusable plastic lunch containers, but on occasion I completely eliminate the container all together! By putting whole fruits; such as apples, oranges, bananas, etc. in my lunch instead of slicing them and putting the pieces in a container or baggy, I save the energy necessary to wash the reusable containers. Also, when a bag of a food item (such as baby carrots) is almost empty, I bring the food in it's original packaging instead of putting it into a new container.

This is a very good point! I never thought about it before, but all of the paper products and plastic bags we use everyday at lunch can really add up to a lot! I like the idea of bringing things in reusable containers to lunch, and I myself have a reusable lunchbox, although I bring most of my food from home in plastic bags or the original container. From now on I will have to think about reusing the bags or putting things into reusable containers!

I think that you have brought up a great point. There are many ways that people can cut back on using plastics, which would help the environment greatly. People can reuse ziploc and plastic bags. People could also start using reusable bags for grocery shopping. A lot of people don't think about the plastic that they use. If people actually took time to try and cut back on the things that hurt the environment, it would help tremendously.