Fix your pants!

Summer! It's soooo hard to sew when it's nice outside. And since it's so nice all I want to wear are capris! Really, it's been gorgeous. So I bought some awesome designer (Gloria Vanderbilt) pants at Kohl's--I know, I'm such an old lady-it gets better! I wore them with the fam at Zion's National Park. Here is me and Baby #3 in the backpack carrier and midway through the hike I noticed my pants were FALLING OFF!!! I couldn't wear my awesome orange cargo capris the rest of the trip. And when you're in the wild, you want to wear orange.

You ask, What did you do Sewing Friend?

(First, I have to mention a belt wouldn't fix the problem because the belt loops in the front were not the same size as the belt loops in the back and nothing would fit through.)

I added elastic to the back casing to "grip" my back waist.

Step 1: Unpick the inside seam of your pants about 3 inches. Work from the side seams in the back and when you sew again, you won't see extra stitches.

Step 2: Sew in a length of elastic (I used 3/4 inch wide) on the side seam.

Step 3: Feed the elastic in the casing (space between the open seams.) I used this neat red plastic thing that allows you to pull elastic or ribbon or whatever through a casing.

Step 4: Pull through and adjust to just the right "grippiness" by trying on the pants. Pin elastic and stitch on other side seam. Trim excess elastic.

Step 5: Sew over where you unpicked the inside seam to close the casing.

Step 6: The finished product.

Now back elastic is a bit old-lady, but while you're wearing it, the elastic stretches out and you can't tell

-and your pants don't fall down (and you get to see a totally unflattering picture taken by myself while wearing the pants!)

Try this at home and have great fitting pants! Good luck and buy some orange pants-they rock!