Osborn Fiber Studio

Welp, I’ve pressed the “Publish” button on Migraineur. Now we’ll just wait for the machinery of self-publishing to churn… Appropriately, we are now at the halfway point, day 6, of the pattern reveal party!

I have a thing for clamshells. I’m attracted to clamshell designs on wallpaper, in stationary, or even in quilting. Today I’ll show you Toasthands: the first of three patterns that feature clamshells. My excuse for including clamshells is that I was inspired by the sort of humpy shapes on the top of a piece of toast. Imagine many slices of perfectly shaped toast layered just so? You have clamshells.

Why toast, though? When I’m in bed with a migraine, and it’s bad enough to cause referred nausea, the only thing I can wrap my head around eating is a piece of buttered toast. (Think BRAT diet. This comes up again in the book). Toast has become a sort of personal symbol of migraine. (Is that one of the weirdest sentences I’ve ever typed? Probably not.) I became rather fixated on toast, so for a long time, “Toast” was the working title for this whole book. I imagined so many toast patterns, including a massive hap with bread shapes worked in lace… that one got scrapped, probably for the best. But I did settle pretty fixedly on clamshells as a stand-in for toast.

The above mittens are knit with Cowslip and Hare of Milarrochy tweed, for the “Butter on Rye” colourway. If you want some more colour in your life, though, grab some jewel shades for the “Allfruit” colourway, below.

These mittens feature deep cuffs in corrugated ribbing, changing needle size halfway up for a bit of flare. Like all fair isle mittens, I suggest you knit these inside out to keep your floats loose. If you knit fair isle with both hands, you can swap hands every four rows to keep the patterning exceptionally even. You’re working the widest part of each clamshell for four rows – keep that colour in your left hand, crossing under, so it pops more. (Just make sure that you knit the vertical lines of the thumb gusset with the same hands every time, or the lines will wiggle.)

Regardless of your jam, butter, or even margarine, I hope you enjoy your Toasthands.

Thanks to Ruth O’Nell for knitting the Butter on Rye colourway, and to Stringbean for modeling.