Bradford Pear

I had two or three nice titles picked out that I was going to use for this post, but I couldn't come up with anything good.  It hasn't been a banner week of woodworking for yours truly, I can tell you that right now.  I was making progress on my Pay it Forward projects, things were looking good.  I had managed to scrape out a pretty good looking spoon and a pretty good looking scoop.  I was pretty proud of myself to be honest, but as we all know, you can't be proud of yourself too soon.  You have to wait a day or so..just to make sure everything stays cool before you can actually allow your chest to swell.

Let me begin by saying that Bradford Pear is not my favorite wood.  It is twisty, knotty, carves poorly, is hard, finishes bad, and overall isn't well suited for my purposes at all.  From what I read it isn't even suited for growing in your yard because it has a tendency to split during ice or winds.  Strangely enough, that is where I came across my current supply.

I do not labor under the delusion that I am some professional spoon carver.  I am far from it, but I have made a few spoons.  Probably 30 or so now.  I am getting better at it, and by the time I reach the 100 mark, I might even be good enough to sell a few.  That being said, though, you have to work with materials that give you a good chance of producing a good product.  Bradford Pear, in my opinion, is not one of those materials.  I want it to be, but it isn't.  I am not happy with the results that I get.

I have a little bit of Hickory left that I plan to work with in the coming week.  Enough for a spoon or two, maybe.

I'm going to just throw the rest of the Bradford Pear that I have on the wood pile.  I will not remember the good times we have had together, because there weren't any really.  I will though, look forward to the spring and how pretty it looks in the yard.