Hi Sharon, I know I'm a few days late on this but I went through this investigation in March and got the D90. Yes, all of your old lenses will work with it; however, you'll have to check and see if they'll work with the metering. There's a great site that has a full explanation of all the compatibility issues -
www.kenrockwell.com. DH and I both had a bunch of lenses from our film days and wanted to put them to good use.
I just spent the weekend working on my bead photos. Only one of our lenses has a macro function, and even that doesn't work very well. I'm trying not to go with the add-on closeup lenses because I want really sharp photos. I got an adapter called a reversing ring that allows me to put the lenses on my camera backwards - it works quite well! So far the one that works best is a 35-70mm zoom (that's in film terms; it's closer to a 50-100mm for digital). You put the lens on backwards, frame and focus, and then you have to play with the exposure. You can kind of see what's going to work in Live View (my #1 reason for upgrading from my D40 to the D90), then you just bracket. I also got the wireless remote control that is indispensable for not having to touch the camera when you're using slow shutter speeds. Here's an example of what I did.
I also played with my 55mm and 28mm fixed lenses; they're a little sharper than the zoom. Only problem was they focus too close, but I wound up embracing that issue and got some really cool ultra-closeups of the reactions going on within the beads. I haven't gotten to those yet in post-processing in Photoshop, but I'll upload some later.
The one thing I miss doing it this way is autofocus, only because it's hard to get the focus exact when you're dealing with such a short depth of field. I'm saving up for a real macro lens; just need to figure out which one to get.
Have fun - it's an absolutely fabulous camera!
-Diane
**edited to add after re-reading your post** - is your 35-70 lens from an older film camera? It may be the same one I'm using! I haven't tried a teleconverter, but the reversing ring I got is a Nikon BR-2A. I got mine from the Amazon Marketplace, but have also seen them on eBay. They're about $30, so not a big investment. It will work on any 52mm filter ring lens.