How Sewing Helps with Weight Loss
Last fall I posted a How To on
creating a jeans skirt. I was 26 pounds down at the time and trying to
find solutions to fix my wardrobe problem.
Pro Tip: If you're going to lose weight, learn how to sew!
I managed to prolong the death of my
wardrobe by about 4 months just by knowing how to take items in. Did
they fit perfectly? Not always, but they usually looked well enough that
I could continue wearing them and it would
look like I'd lost 5 pounds, not 25. It was the difference between
needing a belt to hold them up and needing a belt to pull in 5 inches of
fabric at my waist.
And sometimes I would lose more in
one area than another which made some of my favorite dresses hang
funnily. They fit across my boobs, but were baggy around the middle.
Knowing how to sew made them look just fine again.
The other thing that every crafter will probably already
know is that sewing keeps your hands busy. If, like me, you like to
snack when your hands are empty, then sewing is a big help in keeping
those fingers from finding the cookie jar. Hands-on
crafting projects, sewing or otherwise, are totally great for beating
those snack attacks. Do you really want the oils from those cookies all
over your project? Or the crumbs getting in the stitches? I find it much
easier to say no when I have a reason to.
And want a great way to shock
yourself into grinning like a madman? Take measurements of yourself
before you start and every couple of weeks. I haven't bothered taking
them every week as that's far too much like hassle, but
every few months I take them. The moment you put in the new number and
you blink twice to realize you've lost
HOW MUCH??? off your waist? Awesome feeling.
Those measurements then help
immensely when you need a new wardrobe. If you've just lost 20 pounds
and you know you need new clothes, but have never worn any size other
than a 16, where do you start when you're standing in
a department store? Taking in one of every size and heartbreakingly
trying each one on? Not fun. Plus you get some funny looks when you have
6 of the exact same thing going into the dressing rooms. No thanks.
BUT if you have been taking
measurements, its pretty easy to Google how those numbers correspond
roughly to sizes. Some stores even have their own guidelines you can
look at so when you walk in you can timidly pick up the
size it claims you should be and slink off to the dressing rooms and
watch in shock and amazement as the item 4 sizes down slips easily on.
Sometimes you'll need to adjust, but that's always the way, especially
as some styles/stores have weird fittings. But
once you have the basic numbers in mind, its much easier to find what
you're looking for.
And if, like me, you are on a tight
budget? Well, saving those clothes for a little bit longer is a BIG
help. It is difficult to resell the general everyday crap you wear to
death. A lot of places won't take it, it looks a
little lumpy, and who wants to buy a 2nd hand white tshirt when they
can buy a cheap new one for almost the same price? For 6 big black trash
bags of clean clothes we got a whopping 32 Euro. They're going to
resell some of it and make a mint off us, but I'm
happy that they're all out of the house. This way our fat clothes
aren't tempting us to fill them back up.
Of course, in their place we're
missing tons. I now have 3 feet of rack space in my closet, 2 empty
drawers and I haven't even started on the closet shelves yet.
This is great though! Because of my
sewing abilities, we were able to keep a lot of these items in use for months past their sizing prime. Our size is
unlikely to drastically change from here on out
which means anything we buy will be grand. And who needed extra
cardigans for the summer anyway?
There were, naturally, some items I
just can't bear to throw away. Those have migrated to a pile that I will
sit down and fix once I have the time. Not only will they get
fixed, but they'll be tailored to fit me perfectly.
Because they have room in the bust, they will not end up looking like
I'm trying to tear the fabric to squeeze my cleavage in. Its going to be
great.
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