Customizer or Curriculum User?

I have my 2nd grade curriculum ready to be scheduled out and while visiting a few homeschooling boards, I realized that there is a number of "customizers" and "curriculum users". Look at my blog, you can tell I'm a customizer. But what I don't know is when to customize and when to follow a curriculum.

When I first started researching homeschooling, I requested all the catalogs I could find. As I looked at the options I realized a few things, I needed to figure out WHAT to use and WHEN and HOW. What is the determining factor? Other than the amount of children you have to homeschool, where does the comfort zone of the what, when and how begin and end?

I've thought about my goals, to use good literature in both spines and readers, to expose my children to a variety of viewpoints, to use engaging and fun products to facilitate learning as much as possible...but I could do this with curricula and piecing something together.

I would love to hear your feedback!