A Sock Surgeon’s Afterthought Heel for Self-Striping Yarn also works great with solid or variegated friends!

This technique is a great way to handle yarns where you don’t want to disturb the established pattern by changing the stitch count over the heel shaping. It’s also ideal if you need something really simple to knit (a plain sock with no shaping until the toe) and would rather worry about the heel business afterward!

This video tutorial and its companion PDF (NLA) show how to work an afterthought heel by snipping a stitch and unraveling a hole for the heel (no waste yarn). It’s not as scary as it sounds!

The PDF document is a bit of a rough sketch as it assumes you’re already comfortable with choosing your gauge and sock sizing. It does, however, provide the math and shaping directions to complement the technique shown in the video.