Step 1 and 2

Step 1: Practice practice practice.
I have turned a bed in my backyard into my first ever veggie patch. I'm hoping to make some mistakes on a small scale before I get my hands on some real land. Which leads me to...
Step 2: Find the land
Mom found 80-some acres that looks pretty good. It's only 40 minutes from work (a 20 minute commute savings each way), has a year-round pond, and is on good paved roads with some south-facing potential build sites. It's mostly grass-land with some swaling done, but it looks old and may not be really on contour. I'm absolutely crazy about the pond and would love to build my house on the south-facing hill overlooking it. That would be awesome.
I think I need to figure out how much water I would need to be in there in order to support an actual fish population. I also need to learn more about micro climates, so I can plan out where to put which crops, animals, trees, and outbuildings.
Now all I need is the funding to buy said land. We are so close to having the money to pull the trigger, I can taste it. So at this point, I will default to step 1. So far I've learned about damping off, fungus gnats and possible ways to water house plants when not at home. I've had exactly one win out of the above list of experiments. :)
I chalk each win up to something I won't have to learn when I do it on a larger scale, and hopefully I'll end up with some sort of food crop this season. Every time I look at my little salad green planters, my heart does a little happy-dance. I just will have to have faith that each time I try, it will get a little bit better.

http://www.gardensalive.com/article.asp?ai=803