Daisies for Cauliflower

My grandniece Cauliflower will be turning 12 this August, and of course such an occasion calls for a sweater. 

I searched Ravelry for a suitable pattern and found the Daisy Delight sweater pattern, and the coordinating hat pattern you see pictured above. They are Drops designs, and available for free. In March 2021, when the stores in Ontario were briefly open, I went to Romni Wools on Queen Street and bought 450 grams of Drops Karisma in Rose (shade # 80). I had some cream Drops Karisma DK left over from another project that I decided to use for the daisies, and a little Jamieson's of Shetland DK in Leprechaun (shade #259) left over from this project that would do for the daisy centres -- the sweater pattern requires just two rounds of the daisy centre colour. 

Here's the finished sweater, in a size 11/12. It knitted up in just a few weeks and with no mistakes to speak of. I'm reasonably pleased with it.

Here's the hat. It turned out fine too. A matched sweater and cap set is such a cute look on a young girl. 

It's not much fun for a kid to get a wool sweater in August, so I threw in a few little inexpensive things from the dollar store and thrift shop that Cauliflower can use right away. The item on the left is a planner with stickers, the item on the right is a temporary tattoo kit, and the item above is a little owl ring I found in a thrift shop. 

Cauliflower has thing for owls, and one can't beat a cute ring like this for $2. I just hope it isn't too big for any of her fingers. It fits my ring finger, which means it's a size 7, it can't be sized, and Cauliflower is smaller than average for her age and is unlikely to ever have hands as large as mine. Well, maybe it'll fit on her thumb for now, and eventually on her first or middle finger. 

The entire gift. Not too shabby, and I hope it's cool enough to suit a 12-year-old. It's going to get harder to please Cauliflower from here on in, as she'll be developing her own tastes and becoming more conscious of what's "in". 

I had 25 grams of the new dusty rose yarn left, and used 23 grams of the cream yarn and 2 grams of the green yarn that I had on hand, so when it came to calculating stash increase/decrease for this project, I broke even.