I figured if I could make a welted box cushion without a pattern, I could handle some knit PJ pants for DD, whip them out while she was at school. Well, I didn't finish the waist or hems, tried them on when she got home and they were huge! I used Simplicity pattern 4005, cut very carefully to size 5 (largest size in pattern), it really was stretching the limits of the remnant I had to get the crotch extensions to fit on the fabric. I took a 3/4" dart in the front and a 1 1/2" dart in the back and it's still baggy on DD, the waist is still 21" and I swear she's a 22" but it hangs. She also complained about the "bunch" in the back where the seam is at the waist/seat and then is folded over for the elastic so it's 4 thicknesses of a thin knit for about 1 square inch. I only hand-stitched the bottom of the casing so I can rip it out, put the elastic on the outside and fold it over to the outside and maybe it won't bother her as much - also cut the elastic shorter.

Is there any way at this point to cut some fabric out of the waist so it doesn't have to overlap or gather as much? The whole reason why I decided to start making her pants was b/c she's outgrown the largest size Garanimals and everything else is too tight in the bum (I didn't take the darts all the way down to the crotch) and she complains about seams and tags.

I can't figure it out - no finished waist/hip measurements given for the pants, but the body measurements for a size 5 were 21.5" waist (not!) and 26.5" hip. I even stitched a second seam along the inner legs b/c with 5/8" (OK, maybe it was closer to 1/4") SA the legs were really wide, and she wanted these for play pants, not PJs (I was just using the pattern).

At this point it would take hours to rip out the darts and seams and cut the pieces smaller, but I'm wondering next time if I should make a smaller size and just lengthen them. Even the size 2 waist/hip on the pattern looks huge, one half the size 5 waist is 15", size 2 is 13". I got the 15" raw measurement down to 10.5" with the darts and gathers, wondering if I can get it to fit snug (but not tight!) around DD's 22" (?) waist if I use the size 2 or 3 pattern with size 5 length? How do you tell from the pattern what size will fit, or how do you alter the pattern for the "model's" measurements? B/c it doesn't look like I can trust the "body measurements" on the package.

Thanks.