I'm a level 17 wood elf with a specialty in archery. I do want a good light armour set and one-handed sword (that I can enchant) and shield, but don't really know where to find them. Just seeing pretty generic gear in teh shops for sale.

Any good quests that will yield some good gear along these lines?

Go raid achient Nord ruins and go get the bounties that the bar tender gives you. You find GOOD stuff there. The Whiterun black smiths alwase have good [censored] too.

Have you been ignoring the smithing skill tree? 90% of the time, the stuff you make yourself is better (and more reliable to get) than browsing a store.

Anyway, according to drop rates, you should have access to Elven armor and Dwarven/Dwemer weapons. If you get lucky, you'll find scaled armor and elven weapons.