I love those BabyLegs. I use them on Sam all the time, not so much in the summer, but still sometimes on chilly evenings or rainy days. They're great because baby pants always ride up and baby socks are so short, so the BabyLegs cover their little bare shins. And I often use them in place of pants, just BabyLegs and a onesie. They're perfect if you're trying diaperfree or infant pottying because then you don't have the hassle of wrestling them out of pants every 15 minutes to sit on the potty. However, at $12-15 a pair it can get expensive to have a whole stash.
About a year ago, I was about to throw out a pair of striped knee socks with a hole in the heel, when a light bulb went on. The heel was ruined, but the rest of the sock was just fine, and pretty cute too. So, I snipped off the bottoms and voila! a pair of leg warmers for Sam. Simpler patterns without lots of threads on the inside work best (argyle, for example, doesn't work very well). Most socks don't fray, the ends just curl up and look neat and tidy. I've made Sam several pairs and often if I see a cheap pair of knee socks with a fun pattern I'll get them with the intent to immediately chop off the bottoms and use them for baby leg warmers.
You can see I tried using the chopped off parts as footie socks for me (this was a new pair), but they didn't stay on very well. Oh well, the tops still look squeeze-ably adorable on Sam's sweet little legs.
