Making clothes work

i know, we were all so eager to lose weight. And a result of that is that we shrink and our clothes don't. I'm in the bottom of my old clothes stash, everything is very baggy. I keep shopping, but window shopping as don't know what size I will be.... so any tricks on how to style the baggy stuff and use it a little longer? I'm washing jeans in ho****er and using the dryer on high. I have belts. Shirts I just keep very blouson. But the pants are seriously falling off. Sweaters will be great to hide a th thing when it gets cooler.... anything work for people as a short term fix?

Use a stapler to take things in.

Grim, Grim, this board would be a lot more boring without you. I just snorted my water!

I've now made a large stack of clothes that will not fit, and will be leaving my closet. Haven't tackled all the suits and dresses, and the off season stuff. Gonna need big staples and maybe a glue gun to salvage any of those!

Thrift stores and clearance racks are what I used. I'd get one or two pairs of pants and a couple of shirts that fit at the time, spending as little as possible. Looser shirts can be belted to make them look cute, and if they're too long, wear with leggings.

Then when you're done losing and in maintenance, that would be the time to really do some serious replacing of your wardrobe with quality pieces that will last a long time. Until then, I'm all about $5 t-shirts and cheap leggings lol

If you're a skirt wearer, Gwen had a great suggestion to buy wrap skirts, that way you can wear them for ages.

I can't get baggy pants to fit no matter what I do, so I go to Goodwill....a lot! I know all of the sales people now by name:-) Donate, then buy, donate...

Thrift stores are GREAT for the in-between. Also, get a couple of wrap skirts....mine lasted a long time that way....you just keep tying them tighter.

I use LeTote and Thredup (both websites). One is for clothes rental and the other is an online thrift store.

Well, for jeans there isn't much you can do without some serious needlework. Sewing through 4 layers of denim (where the seams meet) is too hard on most sewing machines and is downright killer on the fingers if you try it by hand. You can fix thinner materials by turning them inside out and running a stitch along side the existing seams on the outer part of the legs. You can then strengthen that new seam by ironing the "flap" of material the new seam makes and then running another stitch over that about 1/4th of an inch away from the new seam. Depending on your skill level you can add more than enough wear time to get you through the year.

If you really need to shrink a shirt you do nearly the same thing. Turn the shirt inside out and starting ON the seam at the armpit run a new seam along the old one at a slight angle ... so it gets further away from the original seam as you head towards the bottom. You COULD tighten up the seams around the arms too ... but that is more involved because you have to make sure you can still get the shirt on and wear it comfortably. I'm sticking to quick fixes intended for items that will be gotten rid of anyway.

I've done my first closet purge ... getting rid of a garbage bag full of clothes. Mostly jeans and the rest were clothes that I didn't like enough to fuss with. I've only spent about $15 on clothes so far (3 pairs of jeans at a thrift store) I've fixed about 3 pairs of leggings and one pair of dress pants. I haven't bothered with my shirts because I think them big and baggy anyway.

I go to thrift stores and only buy things that are a little too small/tight as motivation to keep going and so they'll last longer.

I went to the Op (thrift) shop last week. Bought my first pair of size 16 jeans. I have started cleaning out my wardrobe. Giving most of it to my neighbour. Took a bag across last night

I spent AUD$70 and came out with

1 x jeans, 4x Long sleeve jumpers, 1x cardigan,3 x tshirts for my hubby & eldest son, 1 x Pjs for my eldest son and 2 x spice racks to help organise the pantry a little better

I will try not to buy anything new till I work out what size Im going to be - either $5-1$10 clothes or thrift all the way for me :)

Shirley