franken-pants

Today,  I will chronicle the tale of how my DIY projects usually are born. This particular tale might get a little bit awkward... for both of us.

A while ago, I bought a pair of wide-leg white pants {on a complete whim and without trying them on} because they were 99 cents. Although they were denim-ish, they were the same size as my dress pants so I figured they'd fit fine. They were also wide leg and I was really hoping for white skinnies, but I could easily fix that with a quick straight seam and be done with it. I plunked down my buck, thrilled for finding such a steal.

...

Apparently, dress pants and jeans don't go by the same sizing rules, and these were WAY too tight in the waist/hip region. I'm talking the kind of tight that would button if you were laying down, but would strain and pop if you stood up or sat down or tried to move at all. Which kind of defeats the purpose of pants, ya know?

So, I needed to make them skinny, AND let them out to accommodate my bee-hind {ironic  much?}. It would involve some serious patchwork and the skills of McGyver or Dr. Frankenstein to pull this off. So, these "great deal pants" found a new home in the bottom of my sewing pile.

I'm trying to cope with the fact that I just told you that I have gigantor hips. Eek.

I finally got up the nerve for surgery recently. Since it had been a few months since they had been purchased, I obviously wasn't going to miss them if I destroyed them. On the flip side, if I succeeded I would have a funny story to tell.

I turned the pants inside-out and laid a pair that fit me well on top of them, marking where I'd have to sew with a piece of chalk. After checking and re-checking with a ruler to ensure the legs were even, I sewed a quick straight seam down both sides of each leg, trying them on after each leg was done.

I trimmed them 1/4" from my stitches, then sewed a zigzag stitch along the bare edges for added security.

You could either say that I was being helpful for using thread that doesn't match the fabric, or that I was being lazy for not changing it after my last project. It's up to you, but I like to think it was a conscious choice... ;)

You can't even see where the original seams end and mine begin--so it didn't really matter that I used gray thread rather than white it would be even harder to see if I had used white thread rather than gray {Or is it grey? I never know; someone help me out here!}.

To make them fit in the waist area, I made panels using the cut-off hem pieces, similar to how people used to make bell-bottoms out of skinny-jeans. I had to unpick my hip seams all the way to the bottom of the pockets and pin the salvaged cloth in place. Then, it was just a matter of sewing the pieces together {which honestly was a kind of comedy of errors involving sewing machine melt-downs, pins jabbing into hip bones, and pants falling down}

They may be patched together, but they cost me 99 cents and a half hour of sewing time, so I am okay with that. And I am kind of in love with my franken-pants.

I'm totally wearing white after Labor Day. Don't care what "they" say.