Today’s Hint: How to Frugally Make Pre-Pregnancy Jeans Work for Pregnancy

I was able to wear my pre-pregnancy jeans long into my pregnancy, and this wasn’t because I bought any special products designed for this purpose. Instead, I used a free technique (assuming you have elastic hair bands or rubber bands) that I call “the hair band trick” and that is today’s hint.

Basically, I took one of my circular hair ties, looped half of it around my pants’ button, the other half through the buttonhole, and then brought the two halves together over the button (if this doesn’t make sense, see the image above for an example of how the trick looks in practice).

I’m not the only fan of this trick. Megan Nielsen at DIY Maternity is also a fan, and her smart version involves a little knot to secure the band to the jeans. Michelle Hornton, a self-described “master at manipulating my pre-pregnancy jeans right up until I delivered” and who blogs at EarlyMama.com, wrote about her similar approach on Babble, and Heather Flett of the site Rookie Moms recommended the trick as well. Elsewhere, Jill Fehrenbacher of Inhabitots wrote a super helpful piece back in 2008 on how she made it through pregnancy without buying any new maternity clothes. One of her techniques: She used the rubber band trick during the first part of her pregnancy.

Of course, with this trick, you’ll probably want to cover up the band-closed buttonhole with longer shirts, but who doesn’t want to wear longer shirts when they’re pregnant.

Now what about when you become too big for this trick too work, generally sometime around the second or third trimester? If you’re lucky, you’ll have inherited some hand-me-down belly bands (elastic bands designed to hold up unbuckled jeans) from friends or family (I was lucky enough to inherit a few).

But if no free belly bands appear and you’re crafty, you could follow DIY Maternity’s instructions for sewing your own. Or finally, if you’re not crafty, DIY Maternity has a really smart technique for making a belly band with no sewing required – the only requirement is an old stretchy and snug t-shirt or tank top that you don’t want to wear again.

What are your favorite frugal maternity wear tricks?