I seem to pick up new hobbies like some other people get a new pair of shoes. The old ones get real comfortable, and I then one day I spot a nice looking new pair and I think, “Hey – I should try that!”. This week I think I’ve officially picked up a new one.

I’ve been watching these cool videos of folks playing home made guitars based on cigar boxes since last summer. I stumbled across them while researching stuff for a ukelele kit my daughter and I were building. I picked up an awesome CD of cool bluesy licks by Mike Snowden, and joined a news group that seemed like fun. And then I let it sit for a few months. But it kept simmering in the background. One day I was in a store that happened to have some empty cigar boxes for sale at a couple bucks each, so I picked one up. And it sat for a few months too. And I bought some tuners online for a couple bucks. And guess what they did in the back of the drawer.

This week when the DC area was hit with a record breaking snow storm and we were snowbound for three days, I went out to the shop and looked for something to keep my hands busy for a bit. A scrap of wood jumped out of the pile and started to become a guitar neck in my mind. So I looked up some free plans again on http://www.cigarboxnation.com and started working on my second hand built instrument, but my first Cigar Box Guitar.

It’s a three string instrument made mostly from scraps; a pine neck, acrylic nut, bridge, and tail pieces.

I’ve ordered some instructional and inspirational CD’s off eBay, and hope to have the CBG ready to go by this weekend. Next I just need to learn how to play it.