If you head over to the soil, compost and mulch forum on garden web they have a FAQ as well as lots of discussion on the various ways to compost at home.

Yes, I do compost. I just use wire fencing supported by 4 stakes to enclose my composting area. There are also commercial composters, barrels and what have you. Leaves many people will shred with the lawn mower and use them as a mulch. They take awhile to decompose so they make a nice mulch for the season that slowly incorporates in to the soil.

If you have lots of leaves you an also just fill a plastic trash bag with them, tie the bag up and leave it sit for a year or so out of the way. It partially decomposes and becomes leaf mold which is great for gardens.

Lots of ways to do composting at home and you will find darn near every conceivable way talked about on the compost forum if you are interested.

I did read over there but was daunted :O

Thanks for your feedback. I think maybe the best thing is to just jump in and see what happens. We built our holder thingamabob yesterday so I guess we'll just see what happens. Having 3'x3' of compost just seems like so much!

Now we have a ton a trees and therefore a ton of leaves. There's no reason we couldn't put these masses of partially decomposed leaves into our compost container is there?

You can and should add leaves to the compost pile, but do understand that leaves take a fairly long time to decompose. Leaves are considered a 'brown' and you will want to add lots of greens to the pile to get those leaves breaking down faster.

My personal opinion is that leaves are too valuable to gardens to ever waste them. If you have a lawn, consider mulching the leaves into the lawn with the lawn mower. Of course if you have lots of leaves you have to be careful not to smother the lawn with too deep a layer of leaves. Any extras can go on the beds for mulch.

If you still have more left, they can go in the compost pile and if you still have more they can be bagged and allowed to decompose on their own over the course of a year or two.

If you still have more consider advertising them as free for the taking. Lots of gardeners in newly developed areas have no established trees of their own and are dependent upon other people's leaves. It may sound funny, but many are too apprehensive about just taking other people's leaves that are on the curbside. Giving them an invitation might just get them all new homes.

Wow. I seriously never considered our leaves to be more than a PITA come fall. Thanks so much for this!

For me, building a frame is sort of a hassle. I've found that a big pile (layered with sticks in the middle for easy turning) is best. I like to cover the top each time with leaves and Burlap Coffee Bag. 2 layers of Burlap is the method recommended in the Seattle area, called InterBay Mulch. That keeps things moist, only lets in the right amount of rain, and you can easily kill slugs that might gather under it in Spring.

When some of the lower layers show signs of looking finished, I just turn the pile top down right next to the original one, mix thing up a bit and generally let it mellow a bit more if big clumps full of worms are seen.

I've found that a layer of Alpaca Doo layered over leaves makes them decompose really fast. Its worm heaven! Pony, chicken, or bunny doo would work just as well, probably, whatever you can haul. Mixing the fresh compost with perlite before using it for planting will keep it from getting heavy or compacted. I need to do that more often.

Thanks for the info, pdxjules. I'm beginning to feel a little overwhelmed by this composting deal :D