Booting from an external drive

I am planning on replacing my MacBook's original hard drive with a SSD, and am nervous about how I am going to move everything from my old drive to my new one.

Can I plug in my new SSD via an enclosure in order to clone onto that new hard drive, and then remove my original drive and install the new one?

I am working on a unibody aluminum Macbook 5,1.

You don't clone to a SSD as it is not recommended. Install the SSD in your MacBook, then boot it with your original DVD and install OS X.

I thought you were going to upgrade your MacBook to Mavericks and install 8 GB of memory? What happened to that upgrade?

Yes! I just upgraded to snow leopard, and am waiting on my RAM to arrive before moving to mavericks. I'd like to replace the hard drive so I don't have to worry about it dying, as my computer is over 5 years old. Unless that's not a good idea?

.....Okay, I just found my OSX install dvd and applications dvd, which I didn't realize I had. So after installing my SSD, I pop in the install disc, then the applications dvd, then my snow leopard update, then move all my files back on my comp from my time machine backup drive? From what I've read doing a clean install (which I think its called) is difficult for people not tech savvy. Maybe this isn't so bad?