Apparently, 84-year-old May Johnson in Northeast Portland has found a good use for the plastic shopping bags cluttering in her house, according to a news story in The Oregonian.

She makes hats and purses with chain store bags and gives them to friends.

One of her fellow members at the plastic-as-art group, Leave No Plastic Behind, turns plastic strapping from newspaper bundles and other materials into purses and baskets.

Johnson also thinks about making buttons out of plastic shaker lids on spice bottles.

These are all great, as an art and a refreshing message to the public about the use of resources.

It looks to me like it just stops there, unfortunately. How are you going to commercialize these lovely ideas? If commercialization can't be done, then it's not gonna solve or mitigate the shopping bag issue.

First, let's take a look at how these special hats and purses are produced:

Johnson cuts the plastic bags into strips and braids four at a time into a flat rope that she then sews together. She fashions flowers from remaining plastic for the hats and either braids a button-shaped clasp for her purses or employs a plastic bottle cap. Particular skill comes in lining up the colors into a crosshatch or a herringbone pattern.

I don't know about you, but I can't help but wonder if the plastic bags are washed, or better,sterilized before their transformation. Is it safe to actually wear these hats? What about the printing ink on the bags? How many bags does it take to make a hat? How durable can they be?

Even assuming the product is good and safe, the required manual labor dampens the chance of large-scale production.

Well, that's under the assumption that the production takes place in the States. It's different in China. Those of you who have been to China, do you recall seeing products fabricated from plastic tubes in the mid-90s? They came in all kinds of designs, mostly animal shapes such as pandas, kittens and lobsters. I bought a handful of them for a buck. Then, it seemed like all of sudden, they were gone. Newspapers said workshops were busted for making the handicrafts with used perfusion tubes! I know my fear for used plastic is probably ungrounded in the States, where bio-hazard waste is strictly controlled.

Still, unless the safety parameters are tested and made clear to the public, I will stay away from products made of used plastic.