I would follow Bobby's suggestion of making a starter. Also if you have a stone and oxygenate the wort before pitching that would help. Finally, you may want to consider a technique for restarting fermentation when it poops out the first time. I like using a secondary yeast strain that gives little flaor but consumes more sugar and works will in the higher alcohol environment when the original pitch can't do it.
Making the barley wine isn't harder in terms of making the wort. A lot of guys have good recipes on here and that will take you a long way. The hard part is keeping the yeast operating when it hits 6-7% abv. So pole aroudn the forums and learn more about yeast.
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