The easy explanation...

...would be to blame my dad. I mean, I could stand in my parents' house and point at all the DIY projects he's undertaken -- some of which are finished, some of which aren't. Then I could recount (for hours, probably), the projects you don't see: the beater truck for which I helped him install the engine, the loft bed I stained myself, the kayak with hatches I fit so nicely into for playing out on the lake, the kitchen table made precisely to my specifications.

I suppose we could blame my mom, too. She's the one who taught me to sew at the age of nine, the one who made us those matching lavender Easter dresses (even though I got silly putty all over mine when I fell asleep at the church).

Still, that wouldn't be quite sufficient. I'd have to then tell about growing up playing in the sawdust of my grandparents' wood shop. About sitting on Grampy's lap cutting ghost shapes with a scroll saw. About being put in shop class when I intended to take art in 7th grade -- and finding I was pretty happy there anyway.

Perhaps then we could understand my lifetime membership in the do-it-yourself brigade.

My own project list is numerous: the army trunk I bought at the church rummage sale, then covered with so much spray paint I sneezed blue for a week, the broken chair I took the mechanism out of and screwed back together, the discarded dresser I painted, replaced the hardware on, and sold for a 400% profit. The years of altered clothing, half-sewn dresses, and the curtains that still hang in my bedroom at my parents' house.

My view of the world seems to be a little more hazy than most; perhaps it's the project dust that litters my glasses and makes me believe that nearly everything has potential for greatness.

Sure, not everything works out the way I anticipate (Hey Gina and Siew, remember the chair? Talk about a dragged-out project that never came to anything). But I've learned that sometimes, the process is more important than the end result.

Right now, my process involves an antique dress form fished from a trash pile in Galveston. It's rusty and dirty and needs a little love.

Love, I have plenty of. For something like this, I'll even throw in a dash of elbow grease and several hours of time.

I'm excited -- I've been wanting a dress form for quite a while. It's a means to an end; when I have the form fully functional, I can start creating some of the dress designs that are floating around in my mind.

I'll keep you updated. :)