I am just starting out, have a couple razors I am polishing up before I send them out to get honed, found a decent brush and some shaving soaps, all I am missing for the bare essentials is a strop. I know I can use some newspaper, cardboard, etcetera... but in the mean time I would like to figure out a better solution.

Being a student, husband and father of two, I am hoping to find or make a decent strop on the cheap. I found a couple decent ones on eBay but as always within a minute of the close time they jumped from $15 to $50... My next plan was to buy some 3" leather straps cut them into 18" long pieces and affix them with epoxy to a planed 2x4. That way for about $25 I could make three and have a couple extras to use pastes and compounds on.

Any thoughts?