dana's test blog: TUTORIAL: Short Skinnies

I love how easy it is to find colorful skinny pants these days. Forever 21, Target, H&M, GAP, Old Navy. Hooray! And when I was in Calif this summer I went crazy and bought 4 pairs from Forever 21. They're actually twill pants, rather than jeans and are so super comfortable (they fit in the back!...no low-risers).

But the downside to all this fabulousness is that I live in Texas. And summer is still here for a few more months.
So my sister-in-law Laura (who also bought 4 pairs) had a brilliant idea.
"What if we bought some extra pairs and cut them off into skinny shorts?"
Um. Doi.
YES!!

(Oh, did I mention the pants only cost $15? )
Life just got better.

So I bought 2 pairs of yellow and got fixin' to cut.
(okay I never say that).

Voila. Short skinnies! or...Skinny Shorts

You have two options here:
- Simply cut them off, let the ends fray, and have good old "cut offs". Or,
- Give them a new hem so they look like store-bought shorts.

Here's what I did.
• First wash/dry your pants with the method you intend to do all the time.
• I wanted to see how the fabric would fray so first I chopped off the pants at the ankle, washed/dried, and the results are below. I liked how the edges frayed. But I wanted something more polished. So....
• Put the pants on and pin or mark where they hit the middle of your knee. You can make them any length of course but I think they look best at they knee (any shorter and they start to look like biker shorts, in my opinion).
• Give yourself padding and draw a new hem line at least 1 1/2 inches (or even 2 if you're nervous) below the knee mark.
• Cut them off, iron the edge under a 1/2 inch, then iron it under another 1/2 inch. Then try them on again to see if they're where you'd like. If not, trim a little more and repeat.
• Pin/sew the cuff in place using a matching thread color.
You're done!