I've finished altering some of the clothing I found at the secondhand shop and now have a new maternity outfit. First up for alterations were a too large maternity blouse and a pair of messed up maternity pants.
The top was simply way too big - it was more like a dress.
From reading pattern top back lengths and from adding some pins where I thought the top was about 4" too short. I cut off the bottom 3", leaving a hemming allowance.
The top was also missing its waistband tie. I used the now scrap bottom back piece of fabric and cut it into 1" strips. I sewed the pieces together similar to making bias tape. I tried to use a bias tape folder to iron the strip, but the polyester would not hold its shape. I ended up just serging along one edge and then folding the strip in three sections as I sewed, with the serged edge covering the non-serged edge.
It worked and my shirt now has a tie!
The maternity jeans were a different story. They are cheap Walmart George jeans that were not cut very well. As a result, the legs twist terribly. The right leg in-seam is particularly horrible. It actually twists almost around the front of the leg to the other side when wearing. Below, you can see how the seams like to lie in a very crooked manner. This is a good example of fabric not being cut on the grain properly (see this Closet Case Files post for more about this).
I decided correct the problem as much as I could by turning the jeans from flared legs to skinny legs. While I did this, I took more off one side of a seam than the other to 'pull' it back into a proper place. For example, I took a lot out of the right leg back in-seam side and nothing out of the corresponding front side (which meant I had to rip open the seams instead of just sewing a new spot).
The seams are still a bit twisted, but now it's not as noticeable. There are some back leg wrinkles because I took a lot of fabric out around my calves. But, I wanted to take as much fabric out as I could to fix the twisting problem.
Tada! A whole new outfit. And I think I paid only $3 for the shirt and $4 for the pants.
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