Refashioning Pants into Maternity Shorts Part II

Are you still with me on the maternity shorts project? Hopefully you've gotten the pants you intend to repurpose all ripped apart and traced and cut a pattern of your existing shorts using my maternity shorts tutorial from yesterday.

Next, pin the pieces with right sides together, lining up the front and back crotches. You'll sew just the front and back crotch at this point. Do NOT sew down further than the curve:

Here's the back crotch curve:

After you've gotten the front and back crotch pieces sewn together, open up the pants. You'll line up the leg inseams to prepare to sew those seams next.

At this point, I measured both the inseam and outseam of the original shorts to compare and make sure I was on target to have the hem straight across. I also tried them on to make sure they fit (they won't stay up yet, we haven't added the waistband).

Measuring the outseam:

For the waistband, you'll need some stretchy jersey fabric. Cut it so it is 14" high in the non-stretchy direction and then in the stretchy direction, cut it so that the diameter goes around your waist minus 4". I cut my stretchy fabric into 2 pieces.

Pin the 14" edges.

Sew the two pieces into a tube and then fold the tube in half with wrong sides together.

With the shorts inside out, insert the tube into the waistband of the shorts. The finished edge will be facing down.

Pin the tube in place. Note that prior to pinning, fold the tube into quarters and mark the middle of the front and back. You'll want to match the side seams up with the short's side seams and the middle of the front and back up with the short's front and back middle seams. You will likely have to stretch the tube between these points. Use a stretch stitch and a jersey needle.

Zig zag the raw edges (I feel this is optional...)

You're going to hem the bottom of the short's legs. Turn the raw edges under 1/2" and press. Turn under again and press. I did a double row of stitching around the short's legs for a more 'store bought' look.

I'm pretty happy with how these turned out. Free is a good price for maternity clothing!