LOVE the blue-pink-orange in this self-striping yarn so much, I wanted to do a project where you’d see it in individual stripes. Tried knitting socks with several vertical intarsia panels, but that was a pain, so switched to horizontal: slowing down the striping by using multiple balls.

Started with a short-row toe off provisional crochet CO, then knit on with 3 balls of yarn, coordinating the self-striping to run exactly the same as in the 1st ball. I tied a different colour thread on each ball to colour-code them and keep track of which to use when, and to be able to duplicate what I did for the second sock.
I usually like to do TAAT sock knitting, but NOT with 6 balls of yarn attached !

Heel knit with yarn from only 1 ball, =then that ball of yarn was out of sync with the 2 others, so consequently, I worked in the yarn that was used for the heel more frequently than the “normal” every 3rd row, working it every 2nd row, until it was back in sync with the other 2.

Because the spiral formed by the knit rows you’re building up is now 3 rows high, not 1 row as in knitting with just 1 thread of yarn per sock, left and right sides of the sock get a bit skewed, and the foot length unintentionally got 1 cm longer than my own size.
To eliminate this 1 cm making a bump on the edge of the ribbing, did K1,P1 ribbing with only one yarn. Used EZ’s sewn bind-off.

The socks were BEAUTIFUL, but… too big for me !

Gifted them to my busy tour-guide friend, so now they’re going places, and she gets complimented on them in many languages ;-)

Last sock pic and yarn pic show true colours in daylight.

One day I’ll knit myself some, with a 2-ball stripe, or with pattern adjustments so the foot length won’t be “out”. The jogless stripes technique where new yarn colours are added on several places along a row (Barbershop pole/helix) would eliminate the skewedness, and an afterthought heel would not take out any yarn from the striping-in-process.

Have done test swatches with different combinations of the shades of this self-striping yarn I have stashed, which look good too, but this again carries the “higher spiral” problem to be adjusted for, will test knit some with jogless stripes once I’ve learnt that.

Oct 2011:
Friend still loves them, and takes them on all her trips !

Feb 2012:
She reports they are still holding up very well, have promised to knit her a new pair (project Czech Birthday Socks).