There are several ways to crochet a striped hat, but my favorite is with spirals. Can I spiral three colors together? Yes!

To start the spiral, each color has a single crochet, half double crochet, and two double crochets into a magic circle. This gives a slight taper to the start of each color. The increases for the crown are worked in each color and there are no ends to the rows, the stitches are worked continuously around in double crochet alternating colors. To end, I reversed the taper with a half double crochet, single crochet, then a slip stitch before weaving in the ends.