Diane, my Fiance is gluten intolerant and a vegetarian. That doesn't stop me from baking bread and curing meat at home -with all the apparatuses that are related to it. She also thought I was a bit nuts getting molds and containers (and since you have goats, I can only assume that our Manhattan NY kitchen has far less space than yours to store things). So I slowed down: I started with a couple of small molds which turned my mediocre experimental first cheeses into something totally different. As she got addicted to the cheese (or at least to the idea of it) I brought in more and more molds, press, draining board, net, aging containers, cheese cave (converted wine refrigerator), hay, curd knife, pH meters, hygrometers and salometer... as well as 4 thick books about cheese.
I got all of these piece by piece over the course of 2 years. As the cheese kept coming, it was always justified to get another tiny thing. I don't actually need anything else right now for cheesemaking (I have everything I need) but perhaps, doing it slowly and taking less risk can do it for you. This way you buy only stuff you know you'll use and you justify the prudent purchase with low acute cost and reaching the next level in cheesemaking where you are ready for the next thing...