Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Skinny kids - sewing project

I don't get all this talk of childhood obesity problems. I mean, I do, but I sure don't see the problem in my house! Just the opposite. In fact, I'm sure if I was good about routine well child visits, the pediatrician would have labeled my kids as "failure to thrive"! At 1 year, Kyrie was 17 lbs, and impressively enough, Trey was actually 20 lbs at 1 year but was only 23 lbs at 24 mos!

So as you can imagine (or maybe you can't...), clothes shopping is REALLY fun. I am SO glad that a lot of brands put adjustable waist bands in their "bottoms", but there is still a lot that don't. And I don't like to be limited when I find cute clothes for my kids! This spring, Trey ended up with 4 pairs of shorts that didn't have an adjustable waist in them and of course, basically fell off of him! So I pulled out my (not so) trusty sewing machine and got to work. I had intended to post these pictures right after I took them, but as we know, the best laid plans...

So lets get started. (our model wasn't too sure about having pictures with his shirt off!)



It's really hard to play cars when you have to go around holding your shorts up!


On the inside of the waist band, using a seam ripper, I made a vertical slit


Attaching a safety pin to the end of the elastic,


Thread it through and out the other side.


Secure one side with a pin and tighten to the desired size.


Now we're all pinned and ready to sew.


Zig zag stitch forward and backwards a few times to secure the elastic well.


Here is the inside, finished.


And the outside stitch... you can hardly see it with this pattern!

No more holding your shorts up!


This is a very simple thing... it can be sewn by hand if you don't have a machine, and honestly takes no sewing skills!

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12 comments:

Janelle said...

We have the same problem at our house too! I never thought to try this though.....what a great idea!!! I'm gonna give this a try. Thanks! :)

The J's said...

I remember when the adjustable elastic waist bands came in. Wow, what a help! I had little skinny girls and boys too, and they ended up with tucks. Not near as nice!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the tip. My kids are all tall and average/low for weight (Bee: 80% WT/90% ht - T-boy and Pip: 90% wt/95% ht)
I LOVE adjustable bottoms. But, like Trey, sometimes we end up with some that aren't. I'll have to remember this idea.
Love, Rae

Lenetta said...

I remember you talking about this! So glad you posted - much easier to conceptualize now. I think I'm going to have to do the same thing - my little one has a lot of droopy drawers, especially since she no longer has that big fluffy cloth diaper to hold things up. :>)

Huisman5 said...

Good idea! I bought Kyle some Slims at WalMart and he asked if they had anything skinnier! Glad that even size 14's still have the tabs to shrink them! Wish I had that problem.

Ant gKey said...

Yay You Nish! That is great...I wish I had thought of that one a time or two. It is lots better than the old sewing in a tuck thing. That was always tricky and bulky anyway, besides it not being as easy to adjust to changing sizes.

Dalayna said...

Great Job!! We have that problem with Jessi. Maybe when you're up here we'll have you fix that skirt that mom got her so she can wear it!

Gramma's Corner said...

I wonder how come we all have a bunch of skinny kids. I like to put overalls on Zane since NO baby pants fit him. He's at 95% height to 50% weight!

Njos Family said...

I think my Mom put elastic in all of us three girl's skirts clear up till we were old enough to ask her to please put elastic in this one too. :)

Kelly said...

Nice! I'm probably going to have to use this some day. It seems as though Jackson is going to have his daddy's build.

Shauna said...

Great idea. Thanks. But, are you doing one slit and it's coming out of...where? or, am I supposed to cut 2 slits a certain width apart. Sorry, I really don't sew anything other than pillows and buttons.

Lynisha Weeda said...

Shauna - because these particular shorts already had some elastic in the back, I made the slits on the sides, and coming out on the front near the button / button hole. If there was no elastic in the back, I would have cut slits on the sides/ near front, and pulled the elastic all the way around the back to the other side.
Does that make sense?