The Beginning of the Beginning

This is the beginning of the beginning of my year long commitment to a community garden. I grew up with gardens, but they were on a large scale or at least larger than most home gardens. My family owned two adjacent lots. The house set on one lot and the garden on the second lot. We would plant rows and rows of tomatoes, okra, green beans, squash, ect. It probably covered about 85% of the second lot. The fresh produce was consumed throughout the spring and fall and we would can certain items for the winter. This was gardening on large scale and it tends to be how I think about gardening because it is what I know. A community garden, on the other hand, is smaller. Often they are square or rectangle raised beds. The small size is new for me so I have been doing research on planting in raised beds. I've also been doing research about planting in my state, which is Texas. The weather is drier and hotter. Spring and fall are shorter, and one can argue that winter is non-existent. This means I've been reading about which varieties of vegetables are best suited for Texas. Luckily, the agricultural colleges in Texas have done a lot of research on this topic and it is readily available online. The question is whether I can find those varieties in a nursery store near me. I have several weeks before I officially receive my plots so I will continue to research until then.