Oh, I've been a card-carrying member of the men's jeans club since the age of 14! It started with a pair of my dad's hand-me-downs (we wear the same size), and I haven't bought women's jean's since.

Inherent figure "issues": long legs, J Lo booty, waist so high I look like Ed Grimley if I wear pants on it...

I was always a big fan of Gap's relaxed fit jeans, but it seems the quality's gone down in the past few years. Then my boyfriend introduced me to the wonder of Levi's 550 Silvertabs.

(Amusing aside: when I drove home for Thanksgiving, I was in such a hurry to get out of here, I forgot to pack pants... except the pajamas I wore for the 11-hour drive. Good thing the boy & I wear the same size...) ;)

I used to do the men's jeans thing...then I got hips. Now I have to wear girl jeans if I don't want to look too huge.

When one of my pairs is getting too tight for me, I stop drying them after washing. I just lay them out flat. They shrink considerably in the dryer, so this has worked for me... (but it takes longer, so it's not always the best method).

A couple of years ago I saw a thing advertised on TV that's designed to stretch waistbands. You could stretch it out and then leave it in the pants, effectively (or so they claimed) making the pants up to one size bigger. I've never seen it in real life, and I haven't seen it on TV either, in quite some time. Maybe it didn't work so great after all.

I've stopped putting jeans (and most of my pants, really) in the dryer because of the shrinkage. I hate it when formerly glorious pants end up as highwaters.