I'm trying to get a general feel for what sort of hobby farm my partner and I would need to plan and save for to realize a tree change dream. The ideal would be to be partially or even (dreaming big!) mostly self-sufficient on a small farm when we have a young family in the future. My partner works in an industry that suits running your own business from home online if we go rural, while we already plan for me to stay home with the kids regardless of whether we're rural or city based and I'd rather be being productive with my time producing our own food if I have the choice. We likely wouldn't be looking to run the farm as a primary source of income, but I'm creative and might engage in some value adding activities on the side eg. milk extra goats and make soap, or some such, and I feel small scale production of things we are particularly good at would be handy to hold up our sleeves longer term.

We would be looking likely in the Hunter or Central Coast region of NSW or somewhere else also within a few hours of Sydney, as this is the area our extended family is located in.

Ideally I'd like to hold on to the option to expand and lease excess space out while we're learning and establishing ourselves, and I'm conscious that if for instance we wanted to milk or raise our own beef or other larger animals later on that they usually need a large amount of pasture per animal if we don't want to supplement their feed too much. However, my partner thinks we should only be looking for a handful of acres...

The must haves to start will include chickens, dairy goats, veges and a small orchard to help provide for 4-6 people (possibly a few more depending on in-laws and location if a BnB business opportunity was worth pursuing). In the long run I'm also interested in exploring some of the following, depending on what our land and water options at the time are best suited to: a few cows for meat and milk, sheep, aquaponics or aquaculture, other poultry like ducks or turkeys, pigs, and possibly a horse or two to ride.

Are my eyes too big for my plate when I tell my partner that 2-5 usable acres is far too small and we'd be buying in too much supplemental feed and etc to make it worthwhile trying to cram everything in? What sort of ballpark range should we be considering - 10, 20, 50, more? I've done and will keep learning and researching, but most of what I read directs me to land sizes based on one or two types of farming and I'm hopelessly lost trying to get a feel for the right longer term size for a growing and varied hobby farm.