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Please take my comments with a grain of salt, I have never built a full strawbale house, but I have:

• built a 10'x10' load bearing strawbale shed as part of a workshop
  
• helped on 4 other strawbale projects, both post and beam and load bearing.
  
• worked in the trades for 12 years, plumbing, framing, finish carpentry, millwright, construction (concrete forming)
  
  Load bearing is in some ways easier, and some ways harder. :)
  
  You can build your walls much faster, and with less skill, but it requires some technical expertise that can be found in books. You need to compress the bales once your roof is on, so that once you plaster your walls, it won't settle as much and form cracks.
  
  If you do a timber frame or post and beam house, the technical requirements of the roof and posts will be your biggest concern. Once that is built and standing, doing the straw in fill is much easier, and can be done by anyone (even kids), makes for a fun time.
  
  I would suggest buying a book like:
  
  Chris Magwood and Peter Mack's Straw bale building
  
  http://www.amazon.ca/Straw-Bale-Building-Design-Build/dp/0865714037
  
  This might be outdated (I bought it 10+ years ago), so some of the ideas may have changed, but it may have been revised since then. I suggest it solely because it is the one I own, and is a really good primer and covers most of the issues you discuss. I also worked with Peter and Chris on a few projects.
  
  I have seen in 2 storey load bearing houses (one of the largest load bearing houses built at the time I believe), which were beautiful, and seemed to be holding together perfectly (after a few years) with minor cracking in the plaster, but this was professionally built (Camel's Back Construction in Ontario I believe).
  
  Try and find a local straw bale group, they can help you understand the local pitfalls.
  
  If you have access to a baler then I think there are some suggestions on how tight to make the bales in the above book as well. If not try and contact a group like the http://naturalbuildingcoalition.ca/ They can probably help you locate resources that can help, or direct you to a group in South Dakota.
  
  

Composting toilets!
http://www.amazon.com/Composting-Toilet-System-Book-Pollution-Preven/dp/0966678303