a response already? I love this forum! (I've tried 'em all)
K Mtn. man, you got my brain going, by 'pole' do you mean an isoparm running down the center of the sole of the shoe? I'm just now getting a good grasp of Nurbs modeling so please bare with me.
I can't try it 'til I get home but wouldn't dividing one of the red shapes in my image in two (say I added a spline from toe to heel) still leave me with only 3 splines to create a patch from?

I'm probably not getting something really obvious here. Thanks for any assistance as this has been a major road block for me.