Hi Elizabeth,
I'd like to put my hand up to help out also - unless Russell is already helping you out
Being the third generation of a military family myself I know exactly where you are coming from with this and would be sensitive to your requirements and budget.
Tweaking plug-ins/code and helping out on client sites as you suggest is generally how we operate for all clients wishing to keep their costs down. Basically, you do as much as you want/can yourself and just get us to help out as needed or when coding/professional assistance is required. We extend the benefit to our clients a bit further also, by providing feedback to improve usability/performance of the site for no charge & providing "free" extensions/tweaks when they are of benefit, as we would want your site to be as successful as possible - what ever the objective.
If you're interested just contact me via the links in the signature block below.
Good luck with things - hope they turn out well for you