I agree - I tend to avoid jQuery as much as I can, and prefer to rely on a combination of css3 and "pure" javascript whenever and wherever possible.
I would advice you to start working with Sass (and perhaps Compass), though - for heavier and more complex css projects it will but your coding time tremendously. Reading through your description you had to do a lot of calculations and patterns - things that Sass allows you to automate and make a 1000% more efficient to do. And with tools like Prepros you can get up and running in minutes, while making your development more fun as well :-)
