And that reminds me...

MY design. Not TGDNE's

Of this very true story:

Once a couple of years ago, on a whim, I suddenly had the urge to design some little 3 dimensional hand knit pears. You can see my original post about this design here. It was, as I thought at the time, one of those true "eureka" moments as an artist where the notion wasn't inspired by anything but my sudden urge to create and my very original idea.

Those pears were received very well by people, and I absolutely loved them myself, so I went on a sort of pear-knitting binge. I was having so much fun whipping those up and making little stems and leaves, and eventually different sizes!

One day I went into my LYS to buy some more pear yarn. I excitedly started telling the shop owner all about my very clever project, after which she directed me to a recent issue of a knitting magazine with HAND KNIT PEARS on the cover. Designed by Nicky Epstein. And I remember thinking "that goddamned Nicky Epstein." I was crushed!

Though to be honest, I liked my design much better. I thought they had a more realistic shape and were just cuter overall. But there was some part of me that began to question if it was truly my original idea. I started to think that maybe I had seen that cover somewhere and it got filed away into my subconscious until one day it bubbled up to the surface, seemingly out of nowhere. I mean...because, this is Nicky Effing Epstein were talking about here. I had only been knitting for what? 4 years? How could I possibly have come up with this genius idea on my own?!

In the time since I have seen many other approximations to my own knitted pears, and part of me thinks "Holy crap! I have been copied!" But after what happened to me in my LYS I could never be sure. And bottom line, I could never complete with TGDNE even if I wanted to.