Maternity to Non-Maternity Skirt

I bought this skirt in 2005 when I was almost done being pregnant with my third baby. I didn't really wear it much because I had a hard time getting the waist band to look right. A couple of years later, I got rid of most of my maternity clothes, along with most of my baby stuff, because I was convinced we were not having any more. Hahaha! The best way to ensure a pregnancy is to get rid of your baby stuff!! Long story short, I was pregnant again and I had hung onto this skirt because I thought I might be able to do something with it. I still couldn't get it to look right, so I never wore it during my last pregnancy. I have since gotten rid of my maternity clothes, yet again. Don't worry, though, there WON'T be another pregnancy for me.

So back to this skirt. My baby will be sixteen months old tomorrow, so I've finally decided to cut it up and try taking that waist band off and making it into something I can use.

First thing was to cut the waist band off. I noticed that the skirt was longer in the back, so I just went inside the skirt, used sissors, and cut the seam out that connects the waist band to the skirt. Then I lined up the seam that connects the top tier to the second, which made the front and the back the same length.

The simplest way to do the waistband is to make a casing for elastic. To do so, you turn down the top 1/4" and press it down. This fabric didn't want to press very well, so I did my best with the pressing and then sewed by the fold to get it to hold still. Like so:

Fold the top over again, this time 1-1/8". My elastic was 3/4", so I wanted to make sure that it would fit in the casing after I sewed it. 1-1/8" was just about right. Normally, you'd pin it and press, but since my fabric doesn't press well, I just pinned the heck out of it.

Sew down the top where you've pinned and pressed it. I tried to sew right on top of the stitching I did in the previous step. Leave an opening about 3" so that you can thread the elastic in. Use a big safety pin to help guide your elastic through.

I always pin the two ends of the elastic together and try it on before I sew everything up. It was a bit big, so I cut off a little more elastic and tried it on again. It fit, so I sewed the two ends together, overlapping.

Now just sew the opening shut and you're done.

I wish I would've made it just a tiny bit shorter, but oh well. Now my questions is, what kind of shirt would look good with it?