Kid's Tights (Underwear & Socks)

Running from the waist to the toes in one knitted piece, a pair of children's tights covers the legs and the seat with no gap anywhere. Adult hosiery gets ranked by denier, a yarn weight scale. But children's tights are almost always opaque and cotton rich instead, often 70 to 80 percent cotton with nylon and 3 to 5 percent elastane.

Cotton content sets the behavior. Cotton feels warm and soft against skin and recovers poorly, so a cotton-rich pair bags at the knee and seat by evening and needs pulling up several times a day. Nylon-heavy pairs hold their shape and feel colder and more slippery. The gusset, the small diamond panel where the two legs meet, should be cotton, because a nylon one traps heat exactly where it is least welcome. Crotch drop is the measurement that limits the size, not the waist. Tights are sized by height across bands like 2T to 4T, 4 to 6 and 7 to 10. Reinforced knees and toes are worth seeking out, since a kneeling child wears through both first.

Leggings in Kid's Bottoms are the footless relative, cut and sewn from knit yardage rather than knitted as a tube, and they never pull at the shoulders. Crew Socks with trousers cover the same ground in two pieces that can be replaced separately. Sheer adult hosiery has no place on a child, since it runs the moment a knee meets a playground.

Winter dresses and skirts are the obvious use, and tights insulate roughly as well as a thin pair of trousers. Dance and ballet classes usually specify a color and leave no choice. Holiday outfits and cold-month uniforms follow. Under snow pants they work well. During potty training they are the wrong choice entirely, because reaching a toilet means undressing from the shoulders down.

Put them on and have the child squat fully, checking that the gusset stays within an inch of the body at the lowest point. A crotch seam sliding toward the knees means the leg is too short whatever the waist does. Waistbands want to be at least an inch deep and flat rather than a narrow cord, which rolls. Wash cool and inside out in a mesh bag, and keep them out of the dryer, since heat is what leaves the knees baggy.