Using a maternity pants extender is an excellent way to transform everyday wear into maternity wear for a low price, especially in the early months of pregnancy. While the third trimester usually requires elastic panel maternity pants, the first trimesters can often be bridged with a pants extender.
Comfortable Maternity Pants
The first trimester of pregnancy is a difficult one to gauge in terms of belly growth. While some women gain weight early on in pregnancy, others do not need special clothing until much later in pregnancy. As soon as your regular pants become even slightly tight in the waist, it's a good idea to address the issue so that your pants, and you, are as comfortable as possible. Nausea and fatigue can be exacerbated by discomforts in clothing and shoes, especially in clothing items that sit directly on your growing middle.
A maternity pants extender is a cost-effective way to make your regularly-sized pants adjust to your new, pregnant, silhouette. Depending on the type of extender you buy, you can gain several inches of room in the waist by adding an extender to the belt area of your pants. If you are putting on a lot of weight, you may want to invest in good maternity pants with an elastic front panel, since an extender may only buy you a month or may not even be comfortable from the start.
Maternity Pants Extender Types
Several different types of extenders are on the market, ranging from a very simple button with what looks like a hair elastic attached to the side of it to elastic extenders with words or images printed on them. The type you buy will depend on the style you prefer, as well as the amount of extension you require in order to make your pants comfortable again.
The Button Extender
Called 'the button,' this extender looks like a hair elastic with a button. This extender is very simple and very economical, but it has limited applications, especially for those with a rapidly-expanding waistline. The button does a good job of adding a small amount of stretch to the waist of your pants; however, it leaves a triangle of bare skin exposed. If you wear long tunic tops, this option may still appeal to you, and in the summertime, you may not be opposed to showing a little skin anyway. Alternatively, you can cover up the bare skin with a cute belly band.
The Belly Belt
Offering considerable versatility both in size and color, the belly belt comes with two different sizes of extenders and three different colors of fabric panels to cover the exposed skin that would otherwise show. Simply attach a fabric panel to whichever size extender is suitable for your stage of pregnancy, attach both sides to the existing buttons on your pants, and tuck in the fabric panel.
The belly belt is designed to go a long way into pregnancy, for some women. How long you can use this option to modify your everyday clothes depends on how much weight you are gaining and the distribution of the weight. The belly belt may still work around your middle, but your pants may have become tight in other places. In this case, or if the extender becomes uncomfortable around your middle, you should discontinue use and opt for traditional maternity pants.
B-Buckles
A company in California makes adorable maternity pants extender buckles with words and/or images put onto the extender. While many extenders try to camouflage their own presence, these extenders draw a little extra attention to the fact that the woman sporting the fashion has a baby bump. Customers love the look of the bands and report that there is plenty of room to grow into these extenders as the pregnancy progresses. These can be purchased directly through the B-Buckles website.
Costing between $10 and $25 depending on which option you choose, a pants extender can certainly be an economical solution for minimizing the amount of maternity clothing that you have to purchase in order to comfortably clothe yourself during the nine months of pregnancy.
