The Denim Diet: Sixteen Simple Habits to Get You Into Your Dream Pair of Jeans (New World Library, March 2009)
The No-Nonsense Guide to a Smaller You and a Healthier Planet
Kami Gray is a Portland based TV and Film Wardrobe Stylist with a Ph. D. (Pretty Hot in Denim). She has worked with Hollywood stars like Patty Duke, Shannen Doherty, Amy Smart, John Corbett, and Jenny McCarthy. Her creations have appeared in commercials for Toyota, Nike, Discover Card, and other major companies and in television shows such as House, Veronica Mars, and Hell’s Kitchen. Visit her online at www.thedenimdiet.com and blog.kamigray.com.
Kami says a dream pair of jeans can be a great motivator for losing weight and keeping it off. She doesn’t trust the bathroom scale, but says a pair of jeans will never lie. Kami ought to know. She’s spent twenty-two years cultivating a way of eating that makes sure her favorite jeans will always fit. That wasn’t always the case. At age nineteen, her jeans were six sizes larger than they are today. Then she had an epiphany, which you will read all about in The Denim Diet, and created a no-nonsense blueprint for reaching and maintaining your ideal healthy body weight in sixteen easy-to-remember habits to make and habits to break.
Q & A with Kami Gray:
Why do you call your program The Denim Diet?
Due to a flight cancellation en route to a family holiday, I took an unplanned six-hour drive from Dallas to the Texas Panhandle. It was my first trip to Texas. Along the way, I saw numerous billboards for seventy-two-ounce steaks and a mind-blowing number of obese people. While visiting a store called Sheplers in search of the perfect pair of Wranglers, I came across a pair of jeans so large that I jokingly said to my friend that even the denim needed to go on a diet. I also wanted a catchy title for my book and who can’t relate to fitting into a great pair of jeans? I also happen to be a wardrobe stylist and I’m completely denim addicted. I use my jeans as a replacement for the bathroom scale. What better way to tell if I’ve been overdoing it. If they feel a little snug or a little muffin top is forming around the top of my waistband, I know I need to rein my eating habits back in and make sure I’m getting plenty of exercise. It’s The Denim Diet – creating good habits to get you into your dream pair of jeans or maintaining good habits so your favorite pairs will always fit.
As a wardrobe stylist do you have advice for people who are in search of the ultimate pair of jeans?
First of all, there are good jeans at every price point. I often shop at resale shops for designer denim so I don’t break the bank. For women, keep it simple. For the most flattering look, go for bootcut jeans with a bit of stretch that sit high enough on the hips that they don’t slip down, expose your backside, or make you feel uncomfortable, but don’t go any higher! The higher they go, the longer they make your backside look. The darker the denim, the more slender you’ll appear. Unless you are absolutely averse to wearing a bit of heel, don’t hem them for flats. The longer, the leaner and the hem should almost reach the floor. They should have pockets in the back (I prefer flap), but no weird pocket designs, no embellishments, no rips or tears - just dark bootcut denim hemmed perfectly.
You’re not a doctor or a dietician. In fact, you’re a wardrobe stylist, why should anyone listen to you?
Before my literary agent agreed to take me on as a client, he asked me “Who are you Kami and why are you writing this book?” He was essentially asking the same question, you’re no expert, you’re not a doctor, you’re not a dietician, why should anyone listen to you? Who I am is you. I’m a regular person who figured out a long time ago how to live my life in a healthy way and by doing so, have managed to maintain an ideal, healthy body weight, easily and effortlessly, for twenty-one years. That’s the real secret: you don’t need to be a doctor or a registered dietician to figure it out. You can be you – just a regular person who wants a healthy, slim body that lasts for as long as possible. Although doctors and experts are an absolute necessity, I’ve been doing my own research for over twenty years and then I apply experience, logic, reason, and what my body tells me. I was also fortunate in that I had an unusually health-minded and green upbringing and live in one of the most health-conscious cities in America. The Denim Diet isn’t only about getting into your dream pair of jeans; readers that follow my guidance will become a better steward of the Earth as a natural consequence of the habits, activities, and choices they’re making.
Kami’s book is available on Amazon and all online booksellers and in bookstores everywhere!
A good friend of mine since Junior High, Kami Gray, wardrobe stylist and author of the bestseller, The Denim Diet: Sixteen Simple Habits to Get You into Your Dream Pair of Jeans
