On another tack--do you find that you can recognize your own work, pick it out of a crowd, even years after making it? I did experience this in Philadelphia at Sue's house, a Victorian filled to the brim with ethnic and antique art. There on a sofa was this pillow:
I remember doing the needlepoint, using a drawing traced from a photo of a pre-Columbian vessel (I think) in an anthropology book. As I recall, it was a mouse, and the little figures around the edge are llamas.
I don't remember when I made this, probably in the late 1980s or early 90s. I knew from across the room that it was one of my babies. I wonder if Ruth Buhrman knows hers in this intuitive way? Bet she does.
On reflection, I see the same colors in the pillow and the Buhrman painting. Funny how that happens; I guess the preferred palette is engraved somewhere in the individual brain and we use it over and over without realizing.