2016 Christmas Pipes, and a Truck!

Several years ago I started a tradition of making Christmas pipes for my sons. They all three smoke, one a little less than the others, but all three enjoy the tradition, or at least humor me with it!

2015 Christmas pipes were bent bulldogs, mostly blasted, but with smooth tops, 2014 Christmas pipes were contrast blasted bent eggs w/celluloid, 2013 Christmas pipes were Blasted Lovats, 2012 Christmas pipes were blasted straight bulldogs, 2011 Christmas Pipes were smooth Lovats, and Christmas 2010 was the first year of making the boys pipes for Christmas. They were different shapes for each. The very first 2006 Christmas pipe for for my middle son, John, who loves Bulldogs and loves Christmas, and was the only son smoking pipes at the time.

Drumroll Please: The 2016 Christmas pipes are blasted Cherry Woods with natural plateaux tops. And this year I also made a toy lumber truck for my 19 month grandson, Calvin. The pipes have exotic wood stem accents, and I made tampers to match. Chris’s pipe has a curly maple insert and tamper, which matches the wood used for part of Cal’s truck. John’s and Daniel’s have black and white ebony accents and tampers.

The truck is briar with ebony accents, ebonite wheels, and brass screws. The trailers use some wonderful Curley Maple instrument neck stock that was given to me by Lynn Dudenbostel. It has a strip of mahogany between the book matched curley maple. Lynn is a fantastic Luthier and made a couple of Mandolins for Chris years ago. He sent me a wonderful box full of interesting pieces of exotic wood. The ebony is from him too… The “logs” were collected from the yard. I can’t even start to tell you how much fun it was to make this truck for my grandson, and he seemed to be having fun with it. And I always love making the Christmas pipes!