What I do to save a buck!

Or:

How cheap am I?

Rails on one side on the house are done. Whoopee!

Dern, that was a lot of rails - a hundred and fifty on that side alone, and that's a short side!

At a buck a spindle (or more, depending on the deals at the box stores that week), that's a bunch of money!

And I have a bunch of rails to go! 

So, how cheap am I? I make my own rails. 

First, I go to my stack of lovely scrap wood that my son Michael and I stacked neatly. I am a hoarder of wood and he's my enabler! 

 

(That wavy wooden thing in back of the stack is a long bench I made from hoarded lumber.)

I then cut down the selected wood to the desired size...

...and rip it to make the rails.

Then it's just a matter of chopping the ends...

...and rounding the edges with the sander.

How cheap am I? 

Pretty dern cheap. But it puts about $600 in my pocket and all it took was a little time and a penchant for hoarding!