You do have to start from somewhere, however. When you start a feed lot for example, it starts with buying a few cattle from someone. Once you have a small herd, raise them to adulthood and breed them, only then are you self reliant. Same goes with veggies and fruits. You have to have seeds to start with, good seeds, not the stuff that comes out of grocery store produce. Definitely check with a farmers or gardeners co-op group for seeds, hit earth day celebrations in your area, the local botanical gardens, farmers markets, freecycle etc. This first year, you have to depend on someone else for those seeds ~ and from then on, you can cultivate your own. The county extension office for your county can definitely help you how to hold back part of your crops for seed.

You can try buying plants at a farmer’s market instead of a big corporate nursery. That way at least you are supporting someone who is trying to do something similar to you.

You can also check places like freecycle. Last year someone on freecycle gave me some tomato plants that had volunteered in her compost pile. They produced a lot of good tomatoes.

You can try saving seeds from the vegetables that are currently in your diet. They might not work, but they might! Doesn’t hurt to try!

Then you need to think about how you are going to grow this garden, getting the soil ready. Are you going to purchase tools? Or make them yourself? Out of what materials?

Lots to consider!

You should consider blogging about your experiences. I think that would be very interesting!

your dream is one that many of us share… we’d love to see you do it!!…. don’t forget all the stuff you need to do your canning and if you can’t freeze foods, you’ll need a great cold spring and rootcellar!… I can just imagine that good old woodstove cooking an apple pie …. ah, yes… just like back at Grandma’s…. see, I still remember… there’s a lot of us that do… it’s just too easy not to… I wish you the best…..