Sock Ball-ettes

Two Left Needles was lamenting at the very end of her post about the interrupted striping on her "Pink Panther" sock. I have a similar problem with striping on socks, and I usually join a separate bit of yarn for the short-row section or for the heel flap and heel turn, in either case resuming the main yarn when I resume knitting around all stitches.

This results in two joins. Can't be helped. I knit in the ends using a technique I learned from Nona.

I was merrily doing this on a sock for Matt, a member of my family. There were two knots in the skein that occurred within the heel flap and heel turn. Four joins, ends knitted in. No biggie.

Then I decided that the foot was coming out too large, and that I wanted to continue the ribbing pattern from the leg down onto the instep to help with any fit issues. Ri-i-ip! Back to the end of the ribbing, right before the heel flap.

As I ripped, I made a tiny center-pull ball from each yarn section. I still wanted to keep the striping undisturbed, so I knotted them together in order. Leaving me with 4 tiny center-pull balls attached to the skein and to my knitting, all in a row. Hee. I didn't have the presence of mind to take a pic then, but now I am down to two tiny balls and the skein, and here they are:



It doesn't really make for a very portable sock project, but soon I will be back to the main skein and all will be well. I wasn't quite determined enough to re-adjust where the stripe sequence fell when I re-commenced knitting, so one stripe has fallen off from the instep. Cry me a river.

Here is the sock heel:


In my original plan for world dominance, the pale orange at the top of the heel flap would have extended around the instep, but I don't think it is that big a deal, now. At least there are no teeny-tiny stripes mixed in with the otherwise fairly uniform stripes.

I still haven't figured out exactly how to handle this with the second sock -- to match, or make a fraternal sock but with uninterrupted striping? We shall see.