(waves from the Seacoast & Concord area)

Hi Deb-
While I haven't done it on that small scale, there is no reason it shouldn't work just fine. You might consider actually putting up an ad on your local freecycle board, as that's where I got started with my first lasagna bed, and my compost pile. I found a gal with a horse, a gal with a llama/alpaca, and I actually have a local farmer with cows come dump a load of poop every year to start my new pile. And there was one gal that had a 'started' compost pile that she didn't want anymore, so I went and got that, too.

Other thoughts:
-Does your local school mow their lawn? Ask if they 'bag' it as they go, and if they would let you come get it.
-Grocery stores (esp Market Basket if you have one close by) for cardboard
-Country roadsides for leaves
-Iffy: landscaping companies for grass clippings (iffy because they may use chemicals on the lawns they maintain. If not, then you're good to go)
-Got a coffee machine at work? Snag the grounds. Or Starbucks. They're GREAT for stuff like UCGs and milk jugs (if you're into winter sowing)
-Hannaford is great about letting people claim their "cull" from the produce section if you let them know what it's for.

I mostly use my compost for beds, but for initial start-up, def do the lasagna.
Oh, and check if your town/city has a compost day. Concord has one where residents can come get free compost. Or if you're in the area, I "think" they offer it for sale over on Ft. Eddy Rd at the facility there. Wanna say the name of it is um...hold please gotta look it up. Here we go: Fort Eddy Road Material Storage Facility. It's behind "C.A.V.E.S" the new vet clinic. The card I have here is from 2007, and at that time, the cost was $19 per yard for compost.
I'm envious of you having a friend to share your gardening with; I'm on my own, but never miss an opportunity to gab about my hobby and all the "non-conforming" ways we do things on this board (lasagna, winter sowing, square foot...freecycling for stuff we need...) People act interested, but I can tell they'd just rather look the other way since none of my gardening involves "going to the nursery in May and buying all my plants and putting them in." Sorry...went a little OT there. The first year I did lasagna, several people looked at me like I had 2 heads, especially the 'resident gardener' here at work.

I started a two lasagna beds in 2007 when we moved to a new house. I topped off the beds with composted horse manure but I can't remember how I saw the "ad". Since there was a token charge for the guy to load our trailer with his tractor, it may have been Craigslist. I started the beds when a noticed a relative had a pile of grass clippings in the corner of his yard. If you ask around you will probably find people who have a place in their yard where they dump leaves and grass clippings. Freecycle is an excellent suggestion. I would post that you were looking for leaves and grass clippings. You might also check your local cemetary about grass clippings. If you and your friend have the room for a large plastic Rubbermaid tote, you can have composting worms. I got mine at the Concord NH farmers market (waving back to above poster).