The Decade-Displaced Extremely Ironic Vegan Home Ec Teacher: I Will Forever Bow Down to Vintage Pants

Pants are, simply but, the best garments to make as far as efficiency goes, because they take so little time to complete. Most pants can be finished in just a few hours, sometimes as few as two hours. (If you don't sew, that may sound like a lot, but, trust me-- compared to the 8-12 hours that a dress can take, it's nothing.) So, whenever I start a pair of pants, I get a little giddy knowing I'm going to have a completed pair pretty shortly. They aren't complicated. Just a few seams, a zipper, something on the top, and bam, you're done. Pants never cease to rock my world.

So, I've had this predicament for a while: dressing professionally. Not that I can't, or don't know how-- I just don't really prefer it. Dress pants suck. Dresses/skirts are great, but I HATE DRESS PANTS. Being a teacher, they have forcibly become a staple of my wardrobe. (Why not wear all dresses and skirts every day, you ask? Well, because generally they require heels and doing that every day is KILLER. You have to switch up.) Now, I've found my share of decent dress pants, but they too require heels much of the time, and every female teacher needs pants where they can just wear a pair of freakin' flats, dang it! I've got some khakis where this is possible, but...eh. Khakis. Don't get me started on them. Grey is the ideal color for dress pants, dark grey. But my only pair like this--because I have yet to find any other in the stores-- are what I call my "schlub" pants. They have what my dad always referred to as the "baggy seat" syndrome, and I only wear them if there is NOTHING ELSE. So, recently I thought, "I need a pair of awesome, wide-leg grey dress pants for work that I can wear flats with...hmm...LET'S MAKE THEM!"

Enter Vintage Simplicity 6348, Circa 1974:

(Stolen. Not mine.)

It took me a while to find the right pattern. I scoured Ebay, Etsy, and random places until I saw this one. Wide leg: check. Hip-huggers: check. My size: ooh, it comes in two sizes? Even better, I have options. (Mine came with 6 and 8 in one pattern.) Now all I need is the perfect fabric. When it comes to nice pants that don't feel like pajamas, twill is it. These pants were also twill. I went back to Hancock to get the grey version, but they were OUT. For like, THREE MONTHS. So, I went to JoAnn a few times, seeing nothing, except one that was kind of shiny. Ick. But, the inside of the shiny grey was nice and dull, so I just flipped it the other way-- problem solved.

So, yesterday I was supposed to go to my fellow Home Ec teacher/college best friend Bridget's party, but--lucky me-- I woke up sick :(. I was pretty bummed, but I had enough energy to complete the heavenly grey pants, but around 5:00, the fever spiked and I was in la-la land. The only thing that could distract me from the body aches was 5 episodes in a row of The Big Bang Theory on TBS. (If you've never watched it, DO IT NOW.) Oh, and remembering that I have these to wear on Monday!!!!!!!!!! :

Now, they may not look like much, but they are solving the problem of the Schlub.

Ahh, relief.

Now, if you've been tracking my vintage exploits, you will recall that the last few patterns have been going against my "VINTAGE PATTERNS ARE PERFECT IN EVERY WAY" mantra. Well, this one threw its own little curve ball... the second page of directions--the part with the pants-- was, ya know...missing. Sigh. Luckily, I had another pattern that was identical (although high-waisted... a project from back in 2005. Post to come in the future) and the directions matched exactly. Thank goodness. Besides... there being Dutch versions of the instructions on the pattern totally made up for it :)