I got a book you gotta check out. It's called "One Man's Wilderness, An Alaskan Odyssey".
The book is the journal of a guy who built a cabin in the wilderness of Alaska. He brought with him tool heads and made his own handles on site, used logs from the area, built a fireplace with rocks from the area, etc, etc... The only outside supplies were cement for the fireplace, and tar for the roof. He COULD have succeeded without them, but he wasn't trying to prove anything to anyone and it made a world of difference for what he wanted.
Really good book, and I know that it really made me think about modern society and what we think we "NEED".