This is the one, the only, the original Were-Care-Bear. The concept was created by myself and Yammy (Ex-Reaper Extraordinaire) while running the Paint-N-Take at ReaperCon 2004. One of the minis people could paint was the above beast, and being natural punsters he and I were throwing out a lot of ideas.

I had just finished painting a few hundred (6-700 or so) minis to use in the con itself and really didn't want to pick up a brush for the next few months until the words "WereCareBear" were uttered. The rest is history.

The axe blade used to have "I *heart* U" on it before I painted over it while redoing him. He's still unfinished along with the Artist Conference 2004 WCB, so I'll have to finish him up before ReaperCon 2005 rolls around.

A funny thing happened during last year's Con season though. Supposedly at one of the painting contests someone else presented a WCB looking surprisingly like mine, claiming they had come up with the concept (so much so that people afterwards asked me if I was at that Con). Rest assured I have hundreds of people on my side who can attest to the original beloved mascot of all things paint'n'takerly. Ish.