Some Info...
I've been building items as I had a use for them or if they would work for a particular situation, or just for the simple fact that I wanted to be able to point to something and say..."I built that!" I also realize that some of the items I build are not something really ornate, but they've been built with what I had available. In the case of some furniture items, I did not have access to a woodshop, so I got standard dimensional lumber and used the hand and power tools I did have. Believe it or not, nearly all of the lumber was cut using a battery powered trim saw, because that's what I had on hand when I built it.
What is possibly more astounding is the fact that often I worked from an idea in my head and some work with a tape measure to get an idea of what material I'd need and where to cut. As a matter-of-fact, the entire couch I made was built without any drawing or design. It may be somewhat over-engineered, but I'm more than happy with how it has turned out.