DIY: downsize/alter jean waist

So I do this thing where I like something and its not even close to my size, but I buy it anyway because I like it and I think I can do something about the size, and I usually succeed, except for in the case of shoes, I just let myself suffer there.

Normally with pants, I just safety pin them because thats the easiest way to make them work BUT! today I decided to finally teach myself how to alter my jeans because its getting to the point of where most of my jeans are too big and I am losing safety pins.

So I am going to show you how I turned a pair of big & baggy jeans into a pair of fitting mom style jean (lazy style)!

Materials:

• Jeans
• Sewing machine
• Sewing tools: scissors, thread, safety pins, pins.. ya know, the usual

Step 1:

Put the jeans on, gather the fabric to the point of how tight you want the jeans to be, then measure that with your tape measure. With that measurement, divide it by two because you are going to create two darts on the back of the jeans above the pockets. First I safety pinned the sections like so:

Step 2:

Then I flipped the jeans inside out and on each side, I moved the pin section to the side and create a dart then sewed along that line. I don’t know how to explain it so I’ll insert a pic:

Step 3:

Then I flipped them inside out again and put them on and voilà, they fit!

*Make sure that you are not altering them too much because then its gets to the point where the back will look weird & bunched up*

Step 4:

I didn’t stop there…  I put the jeans on inside out and gathered how much fabric I wanted to take off to make them more fitting.

Step 5:

From there, I placed them inside out again and started lining pins along the inside based on the new fit I wanted.

Step 6:

I then used a straight stitch to sew along the pins… I did that twice because the jeans were pretty thick. Then cut off the excess so you don’t have fabric all bunched on the inside and there you have it!

I am currently trying to decide if I want to cut a hole/rip and if I decide to, be on the look out for a blog post! Until then, here are the jeans & enjoy!