It's been so warm here since the spring that I can't remember the last time I wore anything on my legs. I last wore jeans the first week in June, and it's been longer than that since I put on tights or leggings. But eventually, eventually, cooler weather will return, and I will want to winterize my Camellia and other year-round items in my wardrobe. Among other things, this means clothing my legs. I'll save jeans and trousers for another day, but let's have a rummage among my tights and leggings, shall we?
First up: my four new pairs of tights from Snag Tights, a Scottish start-up company whose ads I'd seen everywhere, and with whom I have no affiliate relationship –– just happy about my tights. I had heard people rave about them, so when I had a little budget to replenish my rather tired tights stash, I went for these. The colors here are a lot truer than my subsequent attempts to take photos of the tights in my lap, so that I could see them with the color of my dress. I think all these shades –– the two grays (Rainy Day and Slate, respectively), the navy, the burgundy –– will work quite well with my blue dress when the weather gets colder.
It remains to be seen how these will hold up under a lot of hard wear over the winter –– hopefully multiple winters –– but they are extremely soft and comfortable, and I look forward to wearing them. Over the past few winters, I've mostly worn leggings with socks under tall boots or with my Doc Martens, but I wanted some actual tights in a range of colors. I'm tempted to go for a yellow, which Snag also has, but I think I'll hold off a little longer. Even given as long as it takes to receive an order in the US –– mine took about a month to get here –– I still have plenty of time before the weather gets seriously cold. I'm also pondering a pair of gray merino tights from Snag, which at $20 are a far better bargain than any of the merino leggings I've seen. Obviously tights would not be as heavy and opaque as leggings, but most of the time I don't need an actual base layer, and when I really do, I could layer a pair of tights under other clothes just as easily as I could wool leggings. For the winter weather we are likeliest to get in North Carolina, however, I think these heavy microfiber tights will serve beautifully.
I do have two older pairs of microfiber tights which, though they were cheapies, have held up pretty well. I don't love the colors: a sort of pale tan/camel and a cream. But they do seem well-made, they fit, and I'll probably get some wear out of them this season. I also have a pair of less opaque teal tights, which can be fun, though they're a bit bright, and I always feel a little too conspicuous when I wear them.
I also own some pairs of leggings from which I still anticipate getting plenty of wear. They're not new, but I have no plans to buy new ones. Once these really begin to wear out, I will consider one or two good pairs of merino leggings, just as I began to consider merino dresses when other dresses I liked perfectly well began to show their age. But not until. These are all spandex/microfiber/cheap/not-natural/not-ethical, but they are the leggings I have, and they are still perfectly serviceable for the coming year. I think I can make it through a no-buy year just fine with my tights collection plus these:
Actually, the light heathered gray and the navy tights are cotton blends . . . which means they pooch out at the knees faster, but they are comfortable. Of this set, the only one I can't really imagine wearing with my blue Camellia is the lavender pair top left –– which I love, incidentally. They're amazingly soft and hold their shape very well. Pondering all these leg options makes me consider that I might want a charcoal gray dress for my reward dress, because it would work so well with all these colors and saturations. Lots of tone-on-tone possibilities, and flexibility to work with shades of purple in Advent and Lent, which I would like. But I think I'll enjoy both the grays, the navy, and the raspberry with my blue Camellia: plenty of potential combinations and outfits, with just one dress and 4/5 of my leggings, plus all those tights. And we haven't even looked at things like sweaters, jackets, and scarves yet.
I do have one pair of black leggings, only because they came in a double-pack with the raspberry-colored ones. I wear them –– sometimes. But I really don't build outfits around them. As I might have mentioned before, as a rule I don't wear black. If you do, fabulous. But I find myself more and more committed to the task of demonstrating that you can have a compressed but versatile wardrobe that doesn't include a single black item. So I'm really not even including those leggings at all, since I only wear them around the house and to sleep in, sometimes.
Once the kids are at school and I'm back here, I have much reorganizing to do, outdoors and in. It's probably not a bad thing to be taking stock now of these items I honestly haven't looked at in months, because otherwise, as I'm busy with other things, the fall will just creep up and take me by surprise. There have been years when I've woken up and thought, It's cold, and I have nothing to be warm in. Not this year! This year, I'll be ready.