Forgot a bag? Don't want paper or plastic? Boomerang Bags can help

You mean well. But you forget.

The fabric tote you meant to bring shopping to reduce your "paper or plastic" use is at home, as is too often the case. So you sigh, make your choice, take comfort in your recycling habit and vow to remember your tote. Next time.

Felicity Britton is here to help — but also to inspire others to take up the idea of making Boomerang Bags. It's an idea she emulated after a visit to Australia, where she happened to see bins of cloth bags available for loan at various shops.

Take one, then bring it back when you return. Free. Simple. Brilliant.

Britton became the first U.S. outpost of the Australia-based Boomerang Bags operation, now one of about a dozen in the States. The term "operation" is perhaps too strong. This is grass-roots work, using excess fabric sewn by volunteers into reusable bags.

"It's a great way to get rid of excess textiles around the house," said Britton, who lives in the Linden Hills neighborhood of Minneapolis. "There are people who were into quilting, or have old sheets with a 3-inch rip. Hey, we'll take sheets with 12-inch rips!"

Some Calico Corners stores have donated remnants, and private donations are welcomed.

(Bonus: You can also donate any of the excess bags you've accumulated from trade shows, craft fairs and the like. Win-win-win.)

"It's a really cool way to build community," Britton said. "I thought I knew almost everyone in the neighborhood, but there are new faces all the time. We started with every-other-month sewing bees, but now do them once a month because people had so much fun."

Another outpost has just begun in northeast Minneapolis, and Britton has helped groups start in other states.

Right now, the sewers are trying to build a "critical mass" of bags before they place them in stores. The first location will be in Heartfelt, a specialty gift shop in Linden Hills, with plans to roll the receptacle over to the nearby Linden Hills Farmers Market when it opens for the season.

"Ideally, we want to hit the small grocery stores, but we'll need hundreds or thousands before we can do that," Britton said.

But the Legislature now is hearing proposals that would "ban the ban" and prohibit cities from requiring stores to charge a bag fee.

Britton thinks the bag fee is crucial to consumers making the shift to reusable bags, citing figures from Ireland, where, after a bag fee was imposed in 2002, the use of plastic bags dropped 94 percent within weeks.

In any case, she and her crew will continue to make bags.

To learn more, visit ­lhpowerandlight.org/reusable-bag-coop.html or contact Britton at info@lhpowerandlight.org.