Building a Jeep with no car knowledge....

Here's my story, I'm 16 and want to (in the future, 5-10 years down the road) build an awesome Willys CJ2a. The problem is- I have little to no car knowledge at all. I had little interest in how cars actually worked until the last year or so, before then I always judged cars based on how they looked, so I never bothered to be in the garage with my dad when he would work on his CJ-7. Now it's been gone for around 3 years and I think its time I start to work towards bringing a jeep back into the family. What I am looking to do is build an awesome Willys CJ2a (or possibly MB) for off road and on road use, I have plenty of pictures to post to show you the look Im going for. Basically I am looking to build something that looks like a toned down rock crawler. This won't be a daily driver so I'm not too terribly concerned about the mileage. But back to the main issue, like I said I know little to nothing about vehicles or how they function so this will be more a question thread than a build thread, until I start to buy parts and build. My first question is about possible transmissions. I don't want an automatic, but I'm not looking for anything fancy and I am not very good at driving stick. What I was thinking is a 3 speed transmission. However I don't where to look, what to look for, etc. So I need help from people who know what they are talking about. I don't know what information you might need to help me here, but I can try and give additional info to help. Engine wise I am looking at a Chevy 350 Small block. The whole Jeep will probably built from the ground up, unless I can find a frame in good shape, The tub and everything else will probably be all reproduction steel bodies because I don't want to do this to an original Jeep, especially if I decide to do an MB. Probably looking at Dana 44s, 6 inches of lift , 35 inch tires, 16 inch wheels. While I'm asking questions, I might as well ask, will I a small block 350 have enough power for all of this? I probably sound really stupid but I'm so lost so any help would be amazing, sorry for the really long post, I guess I should have paid more attention in the garage.:confused: