Dear Jalie:

My story is a tragic one.  You see, I was born with a condition with which I have struggled my whole life. There is nothing I can take to ease it, and no procedure I can undergo to cure it. Doctors have looked me over and shaken their heads sadly before delivering their invariably depressing verdict on my condition:

“There’s nothing anyone can do about it.  It’s Genetics.”

Genetics affects different people in different ways. Some people even claim that Genetics makes them beautiful and intelligent. All I know is that for me, Genetics has manifested itself in a way that makes me extremely, distressingly, almost comically small. The truth is, I can’t even imagine what my life would be like if I weren’t suffering from Genetics. I’ve lived with Genetics for over three decades now, from the physical discomfort of shoes that slip off of my pygmy feet, to the social discomfort of being looked down at during conversations with tall colleagues, to the simple inconvenience of not being able to make use of the top shelves of my kitchen cabinets. And worst of all, I’ve lived with the struggles of finding a pair of jeans with an even halfway decent fit. I have grown weary of being snickered at in the cafeteria and having to stand up from my seat at the uncool kids’ table, hold back tears, tug up my shapeless Levi’s, and proclaim, “It’s not my fault. It’s my Genetics.”

But recently, you’ve given me a light at the end of my tunnel of suffering. Since I discovered your Jalie 2908 jeans pattern, I feel like a new woman!  No more crying in the fitting room with a dozen pairs of ill-fitting denim balled up in sad wads on the floor. No more rolling up the hems some 6 or 7 inches only to find that the knee is halfway down my calf. No more swimming in the thighs of overpriced jeans only to find that I can’t button them closed at the waist. No more trying to squeeze a grown-up backside into a pair of size 12 kids’ jeans. Thanks to you, I have jeans, wonderfully fitting, slimming, flattering, jeans that even I can wear, despite my Genetics!

Oops. A little wrinkled and stretched out after a day's wearing. Another wash should shrink that right back to a perfect fit.

 

And thank you as well for constructing a pattern and instruction set that make a seemingly impossible task as simple and straightforward as assembling an Ikea shelf. Thank you for creating a construction process that largely eschews tedious steps like transferring markings, hand finishing, or extensive basting. And most of all, thank you for a cut and fit that have now yielded two well-loved pairs of jeans about which no one has ever asked me, “Did you make those yourself?” 

Thank you, Jalie, for everything you’ve done to help a long-suffering woman lead a happier life and come to terms with a condition that has plagued her for as long as she can remember. Though I know that I will live the rest of my life with my Genetics, with your help I’m not going to let it keep me down ever again! Well, at least not in the denim department.

Yours in Gratitude,
The Selfish Seamstress

P.S. I’m pretty sure they make my legs look longer too. RAD.

P.P.S. In case you were curious, the sweater is from a pattern in issue 33 of Rebecca, knit in Debbie Bliss ‘Cathay,’ my favorite yarn, now sadly discontinued.