Burda 8/2009 #127, just the thing to wear if you have no plans to eat, sit, or otherwise move.

A few years ago, I had a pair of red pants that I loved. I wore them all the time. And then I lost a lot of weight and they didn't look so good on me. I gained the weight back, but the pants had already gone their way to charity. I bought red sateen stretch fabric with the aim of making them into pants again one day, and then forgot about it. Or maybe I couldn't make up my mind whether to repurpose the fabric for something else, like a jacket or a dress. Who knows. But I found the fabric again after moving and now is the time for new pants!

I decided to use the fabric for skinny pants, and found what I thought would be the ideal design. This is the photo in the magazine. The pants look slim, but not too fitted. I was looking for a skinny pant, but not too tight, and this looked like it would be just right. These look cropped, and I started thinking of how I could show off all my funky striped socks while wearing these pants.
The thing that hooked me was the description: Slim, petite women look great in ankle-length skinny jeans! This style is in petite/half sizes. I haven't had luck sewing Burda pants in the past because the crotch is always too long for me, and then when I shorten the pattern pieces they won't cover my bum. There must be some wrinkle in the universe that explains how in accommodating a short crotch I am neglecting to leave enough fabric to cover my butt. I am also willing to accept (the much more plausible explanation) that I am not shaped like a model.

So I took my measurements, and it turns out that I am exactly a size 18. I traced and cut the pieces for my pants without making an alterations. There was a little weirdness with the pattern, like two differently shaped pocket pieces. The small pattern piece is front of the pocket. The larger one is the back of the pocket, with an extension to attach the pocket to the fly front. It is a bit tricky to get the pieces to align, but it's nice not to have multiple thicknesses of fabric to battle with when sewing in the zipper.

But in all, it was a fairly straightforward pattern until I ended up with what look like pant-leggings.

Not so bad in the front view.

Not so bad from the side, either.

Luckily you can't tell from this photo that I am afraid that at any moment I am going to split these pants open in the back. I think that the model in the magazine is either wearing pants a size or two too big, or (likely) has twig legs. I have a lot of muscle in my legs, so even if the model and I have the same hip and waist measurements, I am going to fill out the legs of the pants more than her. And beat her in a foot race.
This is a bit daring. These pants do not want to sit, which surprises me because the fabric is so stretchy that I had trouble keeping it from rippling as I was sewing it. You can also see in this photo that the pants are longer on me than on the model. I think that I still need to shorten the pants, even with the Burda "petite" pattern.
The following are some details. Here are two closeups of the waistband. You can see in the first photo that the waistband is rolling even though I interfaced it, indicating that these pants are indeed a smidge too small.

In both photos, you can (hopefully) see the zig zag stitching I did on the outside of the waistband for fun. I think it's a nice little detail that makes them different.