if you can get compost (preferrably not the bagged stuff)that would be the best bet, work it into your soil. for optimum results, go ahead and plan for your garden next year, do so by having a soil test done to see if your ph and nutrient levels are in check.

in the mean time read up, there is unlimited organic knowledge just on gardenweb.

You can also find some good resources & into on my website - see below.

I would suggest tilling the soil and working in as much com post or manure as possible. Amend the soil with Rock Phospate, Greensand and Blood meal if it is virgin soil, and also powered limestone if the soil in your area tends to be acidic. In late Fall, get a good soil test and adjust your soil nutrient levels as indicated. Good luck!

Ron
The Garden Guy
http://www.The GardenGuy.org
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Right next to your garden start a compost pile. Put all your extra vegetables, coffee grinds, leafs, and any other old plant matter you happen to collect into it. Keep stirring it and next fall you can cover the garden with it.

For this year you need to add some Compost to the soil. There are various places you can buy compost. If you have a pick up truck you can usually get it for free from the local land fill. Stay away from anything that says "sewage sludge" you want leaf compost. If you don't have a truck or an existing Compost pile you can probable get some delivered if you call around. Again make sure it is leaf compost and not sewage sludge. As a last resort you can buy composted chicken manure at most hardware stores. That is a fairly good source to start out with but it isn't really "organic" In that the farmers feed the chickens with who knows what.

Depending on you financial resources; it might be a good idea just to buy a truck load of topsoil made with leaf Compost. Build a raised bed using that. Add some manure, then mulch it all with regular hardwood mulch. It wont be the greatest set up, but it will get you started until you can get that Compost pile working.

A good organic garden is all about the soil. It takes a couple of years to really make your soil great. Good luck and keep asking questions.

Your soil is the single most important part of an organic garden so start by contacting you local office of the University of Florida USDA Cooperative Extension Service about have a good, reliable soil test done so you know what your soils pH and nutrient load is. Then dig in with these simple soil tests,

1. Structure. From that soil sample put enough of the rest to make a 4 inch level in a clear 1 quart jar, with a tight fitting lid. Fill that jar with water and replace the lid, tightly. Shake the jar vigorously and then let it stand for 24 hours. Your soil will settle out according to soil particle size and weight. A good loam will have about 1-3/4 inch (about 45%) of sand on the bottom. about 1 inch (about 25%) of silt next, about 1 inch (25%) of clay above that, and about 1/4 inch (about 5%) of organic matter on the top.

2) Drainage. Dig a hole 1 foot square and 1 foot deep and fill that with water. After that water drains away refill the hole with more water and time how long it takes that to drain away. Anything less than 2 hours and your soil drains too quickly and needs more organic matter to slow that drainage down. Anything over 6 hours and the soil drains too slowly and needs lots of organic matter to speed it up.

3) Tilth. Take a handful of your slightly damp soil and squeeze it tightly. When the pressure is released the soil should hold together in that clump, but when poked with a finger that clump should fall apart.

4) Smell. What does your soil smell like? A pleasant, rich earthy odor? Putrid, offensive, repugnant odor? The more organic matter in your soil the more active the soil bacteria will be and the nicer you soil will smell.

5) Life. How many earthworms per shovel full were there? 5 or more indicates a pretty healthy soil. Fewer than 5, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, indicates a soil that is not healthy.
which can help even more in making your soil into a good, healthy soil that will grow strong and healthy plants.

Here is a link that might be useful: UF CES

All of the above is great advice. A lot of it seems to be telling you that you have to wait awhile. Others are suggesting adding this and that to the soil now. I started small and built up. My first year was growing things in two inches of sand on top of two feet of hard clay. I am sure that your conditions are better.

I think you should just use what you have and have a ball. Dive in... start swimming.

For your first year, the advice above is to start the compost pile. Yep. Put everything you can into it. Make it the size of a VW beetle if you can. Grass, leaves, weeds. Pile it all up. Do not even worry about the seeds and what is good and what is not. Just go nuts. It's all good. The compost will cure any soil problem or nutrition problem you have. I am convinced that in the long run, it solves pest problems too. Compost as a fanatic, and you can be coasting by your third year and not spend a dime to do it.

While you are doing that, try to grow with what you have got. Try some beans, some okra, some tomatoes. See what works and doesn't. Try something besides buying dirt or products. I have grown decent potatoes in dirty moss, and tomatoes in mucky pond goo. A weird mix of sandy bird manure leaf mold, with weed mulch, was good enough for my garlic at the end of that first year. Plant easy things in different seasons to keep your spirits high: garlic in autumn, potatoes in summer or early next spring.
Watch the sun and the rains and dry spells. Try things that you think will fail. Watch the plants succeed or fail and think about why. Think about raised beds, swales, and water storage. Learn more about techniques and materials. Save seed. By the end of the year, you will have learned a lot about your soil and what it needs or does not need. You will know about likely pests.

By the second year, you will know what to do. So do it. Your compost will not be spectacular, but get it in the ground. You will be able to double the size of your garden with no trouble and handle it well. More than half of the things you try will be successful. The more you do, the more you will succeed.

By the third year, you will have the knowledge and the resources. Nothing will be impossible for you.

IMO, starting inside is more difficult than outside because of the issues of air circulation and lighting, which in my experience are harder to overcome (and more expensive) than dealing with pests and temp variations outdoors. I would take advantage of that good FL weather and avoid seedling legginess (too tall, and thin) and damping off (fungal disease) by planting in flats or other containers in a warm, partially shaded area outdoors.

Also, germination can be the most difficult part for new gardeners, so there's nothing wrong with buying starts for the more difficult veggies and focusing on learing how to grow good crops instead of worrying about getting the seeds to sprout and grow. The FAQs in gardenweb's "growing from seed" forum are also very helpful and informative.

Before you can plant, soil preparation is a must. Dig the soil to a depth of at least 6-10 inches. Add a two to four inch layer of organic matter and incorporate it into the soil. Organic matter will improve your soil structure and will add nutrients to the soil.

Vegetables need nutrients to grow. A good vegetable garden fertilizer should have an analysis of something like 5-10-5, 10-10-10 or 12-12-12. The first number stands for the per cent of nitrogen, the second number the per cent of phosphorus and the third number the per cent of potassium. Nitrogen promotes green growth, phosphorus promotes root growth and fruit development and potassium promotes disease resistance and root development. If you are growing your vegetables organically, organic fertilizers like peat moss, compost or composted cow manure are a good source of nutrients for your vegetables.

Calcium deficiency is one of the most common nutrient deficiencies found in garden soils. If not treated, it can affect the growth, appearance, and health of your vegetables. The cause is usually the inability of the plant roots to carry calcium to the growing parts. Healthy roots start with healthy soil, so making sure you start with the healthiest soil possible will help.

The fertilizers suggested by sirilucky are synthetic and should not have been recommended on an organic gardening forum. The soil tests I suggested will tell you whether you actually need to spend you money on those things, probably not, or not.

As you can see there are many flavors of organic gardening. I was going to specifically agree and disagree with various comments but there are too many. Here's my idea of organic gardening.

Grow plants that are adapted to your area. You can't grow cactus in Michigan or blueberries in Arizona.

Grow plants in season. You can't grow coriander (cilantro) in the spring/summer or tomatoes in the winter.

Never till the soil or dig any hole larger than needed to plant a seed or a plant. This applies to organic or chemical gardening, but it only really works with organic gardening.

Organic gardening is all about developing a healthy soil to include healthy soil microbes (bacteria, fungi, protozoa, and microarthropods). Those critters need to eat food, so with that in mind, peatmoss and compost are not organic fertilizers. Fish meal (or hydrolysate or emulsion), seaweed, soybean meal, alfalfa pellets, used coffee grounds (free in bulk from Starbucks), blood meal, milk, corn meal, cottonseed meal, and any other ground up nut, bean, or seed are organic fertilizers. Peatmoss and compost have a place but don't expect them to perform like a real fertilizer. After a few years of soil building without doing anything destructive like tilling, you can probably use less of these fertilizers. In any case you can forget completely about NPK and 10-10-10 or whatever. All you need to pay attention to is protein content (is there or isn't there any?).

Don't use insecticides for anything. If you leave the insects alone and build health into your soil and plants, the insects will take care of themselves. You should see more toads, lizards, wasps, and birds in the garden once you stop using insectides. Those are all predators that will help you to control your pests.

Don't use chemical herbicides for anything. This requires you to keep after the weeds. Using mulch heavily helps a lot with weeds. Weeds are very easy to pull out of mulch.

Certain plants (sometimes called weeds) can have beneficial effects. An ugly plant that happens to attract aphids, for example, will also attract a population of ladybugs to your garden if the aphids are left alone. Any population of ladybugs in the garden is a good thing.

Dave, Cactus does grow, and is native in Michigan.

janellelee, i'm new to organic gardening myself. I never used herbicides or pesticides, but used miracle grow and didn't compost. It's not rocket science, it's the way people gardened over 100 yrs ago, before all that stuff came out. Congrats to you on choosing organic methods. My best advice to you is read what you can, and most of it on this forum! These guys are great, and if you have any questions they can answer them. Good luck to us both!