I'm REALLY not that smart...

I was sitting on the sofa making a lumber shopping list for my daughter's room and I thought to myself that I should look into the whole front entry lumber issue while I was at the store.  There I am, staring into space, contemplating the problem, when my eyes land on the wood I have resting across the top of the two big cabinets in my living room.  Oh, for the love of Bob Vila!  Those boards have been sitting there since they were removed from the living room window, where they served as a built in valance for the old owners.  I was loathe to throw them out because each board is 14' long and 6" across.  With no idea what to do with them, they've been hiding in odd places for the last, oh, eight months!  The answer was staring me in the face this whole time, I must be really out to lunch!  I took one down and laid it over the step and voila, it'll work.  I think it may even be the same wood as the rest of the stairs, if not, it's got a very similar grain.  The width will need trimming and the thickness needs planing but once I cut the lengths and mitre them, I'll happily sit there with the free hand planer (I got from my mom's husband and never had a chance to use) and carve away at it until it fits flush.  Looks like I'm going to need that router and table.  Time to start checking the tool sales!  It's a relief to finally have a working plan for the step, but frustrating to know that if I'd been smarter the job would be done by now.  Another lesson learned.

This is one of the boards laid across the existing step.   A bit too wide but looks great already!

This is the reveal, showing how much excess thickness there is between the board and the top of the tile.  I'll have to plane this away.  Looks like a lot of work, probably is a lot of work.  Don't care at this point, I'll just embrace my inner pre-Industrial Revolution carpenter ;)