How to use built-in gaiters?

In my efforts to go lighter and simplify my life, I'm trying to retire my trusted OR gaiters. The pants and bibs that I currently use have grommets/eyelets on either side of the ankles, presumably to use in trying down the the sides of the pant legs to keep snow out. So my question is what is the best way to set up and use these built-in gaiters? I'm guessing people don't tie them down every time (or maybe they do?). Maybe use shock cord (but that would wear out too quickly?). Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated!

Good call. Gaiters are the devil. Tie your cordage of choice to one side and then use a mini biner to clip the other side. The best ones I've found for this are the little ones that EMS uses to hang their sale tags. It's actually a tiny aluminum wire gate, which is important if you take a whip on them. I've been using shock cord doubled up, but you're right about it waring out too quickly. I think I'm going to go replace mine with accessory cord.

I've just fixed ~5mm accessory cord on mine. Made the cord loops a bit tight so I have to pull them down pretty hard to get underneath the boots. It slips off from time to time and I have to pull the cord back but it's a nice, simple clean system requiring minimal fiddlin'

Some info on this thread may help. More of it is about making the grommet holes you already have, but also about attaching it to your foot.

mountainproject.com/v/addin…

Consider cutting a short section of tubular webbing to thread the cord through. This will help keep it from wearing out too quickly.

Chad Stebbins wrote:Consider cutting a short section of tubular webbing to thread the cord through. This will help keep it from wearing out too quickly.

If you go for a long expedition and wear through the bottom of your gainer it would kinda suck.