Sewing Maternity-wear for Fun and Love

Super-cute maternity cargo pants

The past week had just proved to me I no longer fitted my usual clothing as I'd been holding together my various skirts and trousers with hairbands, so I took the opportunity of the rainy day to sort through what I could and couldnt continue to wear in my wardrobe.

Cue pile of stuff that I wouldnt be able to use again until I lost the baby weight - this included most of my work tops as they were too short to cover my just emerging 15 week belly and that tell tale hairband.

Cue pile of stuff I could continue to wear with the use of some clever tricks.

Hmm.  That second pile has very little in it.  What am I going to wear to work on Monday!?

When I was pregnant the first time my job involved attending lots of boring conference calls that other people regularly called in to up to 20 minutes late.  That is a long time to keep focussed on work when nothing is happening.  I took to browsing sites showing how to sew for maternity - both mother and babe.  I looked at LOADS of links (thanks mr google and blogging pregnant women everywhere) and bookmarked the ones I liked.

So I went back to a few of these bookmarks and made my plans.  I had a pair of cargo pants I've mostly only used for gardening since the zip broke and a tank top in a similar tone that had shrunk in the wash and was NEVER going to be able to cover my belly again with which I could make maternity pants.

Perfect for re-fashioning!

I also identified some of Mr Duncan's shirts I could potentially repurpose for maternity tops.  I started with about 8 shirts I'd never, ever seen him wear. After some intense whining on his part negotiation I ended up with these two with which to do what I wished.  They're not even in my colour.  Sigh.  Needs must.

I thought I'd try to make the long sleeved purple number into the very cute refashioned maternity top at romantic history and the short sleeved shirt into the shirred maternity tunic top from DIY Maternity.



I could look in some charity shops for appropriate shirts to make tops from some of the other tutorials I liked:

Babydoll maternity top
Pintuck shirt
Snug belly T
T-shirt to pin-tuck tunic

I was all set to commence with the sewing machine in the morning.  At 11.50pm that night I experienced a sudden gush of brown water which ended in the loss of my second baby.

So that was that.

I hope, one day, to post my own versions of these tutorials.

L.

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