Steve,

Thanks for chiming in! I can see doing it your way for the amount of fabric you were trying to remove, but how about for smaller adjustments? I am only looking at 1/2" - 1". Taking out both pleats would make it too small. Do you think the following would work:

Cutting the waistband above the back center seam
Rip the stitches from the waistband to the pleat back to the next pleat on each side
Rip the center seam where the cloth is joined
Make the reverse pleat deeper on each side by equal amounts (this will mean a smaller reveal on the pleats at the center, but they will still be symmetrical)
Overlap the waistband
Stitch the waistband back to the pleats
Stitch the waistband together with the stitches centered over the back center pleat.

Seems like it would take a similar, or less time, preserve the fabric for future growth, and look fine. The only drawback being that the you could only un-overlap to mae it bigger to a size slightly smaller than the original waist size.