Clothing alterations - DIY Maternity wear

Super comfortable skirt

Although I was nowhere near large enough to show when we left London, I packed a couple of bits of clothing I could alter in my luggage as I knew I was likely to outgrow my trousers before our goods arrived in January.

I figured I'd rent a sewing machine for a week or something once we arrived in Melbourne.

In Brisbane I was at a bit of a loose end during the day - our hosts were working/in school and Mr Duncan was also working all day from a little desk in our guest room.  While we were there, another friend gave me a few hand me downs in anticipation of my growing form so I took the opportunity to blow the dust off the eldest daughter's sewing machine (she's at university in Canada) and set to the task of making some maternity alterations.

I altered my cargo pants as previously planned following these extremely easy-to-follow instructions for maternity pants.  

Alterations complete

The waistband turned out to be fairly loose - still okay as the elastic in the original hem holds them up, and they'll fit perfectly once I start getting bigger and wearing the waistband unfolded, but I decided I needed to use something much tighter for the waistband for my denim skirt conversion.

I had a look around the local charity shops and found the perfect thing for just two dollars which is a lot less than buying fabric here in Australia.  It was very tight on me and two-way stretchy, without a seam.  I fell across a pair of commercially made maternity jeans in the same shop which fit me perfectly so I snapped them up for ten dollars as well.  I altered these using the same method.

Before: skirt and way-too-tight tank top

After

I had some of the tank-top fabric left over, so I doubled it over and used it to make a waistband and turn a comfortable old dress (which had become too frayed and out of shape to wear) into a skirt.

Dress

Gather and pin to the new waistband

Floaty skirt with room to grow

 

The last piece I altered was given to me by our friend.  A large tunic-type top in a fabulous blue.  It was just too wide for my frame (and indeed, for my friend's which is why she was passing it along).

Too-big tunic

My plan was to bring in the neckline while retaining the fullness by using pin tucks per this T-shirt to pin-tuck tunic tutorial but once I had it pinned and tried it on, I realised it would mess up the existing neckline - and I didn't want to cut a new neckline as it was already huge on my shoulders.

Instead I adapted the Deep Vee Nursing Tunic tutorial and simply gave it a princess waistline by using elastic to gather in the fullness.

Amazing what one piece of elastic can do

Ready to grow into

Some of the pics of me in the altered clothing show a bit of a bump (though mostly just bloating at 12 weeks) so I've put them here.

These items will do me for now, indeed I practically live in that denim skirt, but when my sewing machine arrives I have plans for some more alterations to accommodate a larger belly.