Nice house! The first thing I thought when I looked at the pics was "maples" - I'll get back to that in a second.

I agree - ugly white rock has to go - all of it. Maybe laying random shaped flagstone on a sand bed with a ground cover in between (or even bark mulch in between?). Maybe stain the concrete steps a similar earth color.

Railroad ties look fine - I'd even consider keeping them long-term. Have you thought about sculpting a bed on the OUTSIDE of the railroad ties...cut wide sweeping beds right into the grass (you could even use that cheap black plastic bed liner stuff). This would camouflage the boxiness of the walkway and landing area and as you travel to the front door you'd be surrounded on all sides by garden...more planting area & less grass to mow!

In the planting bed to the side of the stairs (and I'd continue on to the other side as well), maybe some nice weeping maples...a deep red one and maybe a taller light green one - just the ones that get 4 or 5 feet tall - I'd cluster 3-5 across the front of the house if they'll fit.

I like the overall brown color. One option for the shutters might be to choose a third brown shade in between the light cream color of the house and the really dark brown - this will brighten up the windows without introducing a completely new color to the house scheme (might be too confusing). If you're looking for a bright punch of color, I'd try painting the front door a bright red or a blue...european homes often have the front door a bright color while the body of the home is more subdued and it looks great. A medium shade blue could be really nice and brown and blue is a very current color combo right now.

That's what I've got! I'd love to hear what others think.

How far is your house from the road? Is there anything else in that space, or just more lawn? I'm trying to get an idea of how much area you have to work with, especially since you say you want a sitting area.

Right now, the "garden area" looks like it would be a little cramped as a patio seating area. Yes, you could fit the furniture, but it wouldn't really feel like an outdoor room. So, I would either put the sitting area on the side to the left of the stoop (currently grass), or enlarge the patio to include the pathway as one flat surface, probably with plantings in front for a sense of shelter, maybe even extending the patio/walkway further into the yard. You might want to experiment by taking a couple of chairs outside and placing them in different positions, then sitting in them, and seeing how you like it.

Another option would be to make the area more of a planting area with a bench in it, rather than a patio feel, btw. In that case, I'd probably have the bench alongside the main path from the driveway to the front door, but I'd make it a curving path.

Btw, if you did get dark forest green shutters (the shade I'd probably pick), I'd probably paint the door to match. Not sure if I'd make the screen door brown or green.

Thanks for the lovely ideas.
zamia - we definitely want to do a flastone path or something like that but not sure its in the budget this year.. if we complete rehab the path there will be no budget for plants. And I hate the fact that the front of the house looks so blah with nothing. I am working on DH - I am hoping that once we start he'll see that we need to do the path.

irene - I am attaching more pics to show the yard from different angles. We are a good distance from the road and we have a wooded area in the front by the road. So we do have some privacy. We want to do only a small seating area - maybe just a bench or 2 small chairs. We have a small bistro set but I think its not going to look good. DH disagrees. I like the idea of a small garden with a bench that you can sit and look at the flowers.

We can't take up much more room of the front lawn. That is where the doggie plays. We have a hill in the back that we will eventually clear out and gain more back yard. And as you can see the yard slopes down as you get past the house. We are hoping to fill this in more with the dirt we take out from the back.

I think we are going to do the forest green shutters. I wasn't sure what the green door would look like with the brown trim. maybe I'll have to take a stab at photoshop.

Here are some more pics.

Front Yard from driveway.
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View from bottom of driveway looking up - actually I don;t think I was standing right at the bottom - maybe 10-15 ft up from the road.
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View looking from garage to street
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View of the wooded area between yard and street
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You do have lots of privacy! I see why you'd want the bistro set out front - it's a nice view.

Would the bistro set fit towards the front of the landing (the big square at bottom of steps)? Maybe there would still be enough room to walk behind it to get to the steps?

I know what you mean about the cost of the flagstone. I'm going to be building a path in my backyard, and while I'd love to have flagstone, it won't be in the budget, so this is what I'm going to try:

My path will be similar (functional) - a straight line with wood edging. I plan to fill it with pine straw (a fine bark mulch may work also). At key high traffic spots, I will lay just a few flagstones...so it will be a natural looking mix. It's a thought.

I would still consider carving out a curved bed on the outside of the railroad ties - it only needs to be 4 or 5 feet deep to have a good impact - I think you'll be able to live with the ties a lot longer if the focus is pulled off of them in this way and it won't significantly cut into the dog's play area (he/she will probably love sniffing the plants).

Go for the green! It's only paint. My house came with a deep forest green door (house is a latte color with white trim...not too different from your colors). We lived with the green door for 2 years and then painted it bright barn red. The green was just too dark and made our entranceway dreary, but my door is set into the house more than yours and you may not have the same effect...paint it and see, it will be easy to change later if you want to.

If you have any plans to put in a more permanent walkway, I'd stick with a few annuals and perennials in the planting area until you decide what you are going to do. Any shrubs or more permanent plantings will get destroyed if you ever do any construction in that area. Usually the hardscape would be done first, plantings later.

Spend some time lurking and reading old threads on the Perennials and Shrubs forums, and your regional forum.
Also visit New to Gardening to learn some basics about soil, and gardening techniques that will ensure a reasonable level of success with your plantings. Go to the library and take out some books on gardening and design, and visit nurseries in your area to see what plants are available that do well in your climate. Read the tags on the plants, and takes notes. You can look the plants up later on the web to learn more about their characteristics and cultural requirements.

Once you have your garden area prepared, experiment and have fun. Annuals will give you a lot of color all summer. Perennials will increase in size and return every year. Ordinarily, I would recommend some shrubs, but if you're going to make changes later to the walk, I'd hold off.

Also, you'll need to know how much sun that area gets and what kind of soil you have. It will probably need a lot of amendments due to compaction from construction around the house and the habit builders have of taking away your topsoil and replacing it with crappy subsoil. The area under the deep overhang of the roof will not get any rain on it, so keep that in mind when planning for plants.

Until you learn a bit about gardening and the plants you would like to grow, and gain some hands-on experience, your results may be disappointing. As you learn more, your taste may change, so start out slowly and don't try to do everything at once.

I finally convinced DH to look into stones for the walkway. I would like to do something like a flagstone - but not the HUGE pieces. Something a little smaller. I am definitely thinking something curvy a little and incorporating a small area for a bench. Once we have the RR ties up and the rocks out we will have a better idea on how much space we have and can work on a layout for the path. Once that is done then I will focus on the plantings. I am so glad that DH came around.

If anyone has some pics of their stone walkways I would love to see them for inspiration. We want something more natural and not pavers.

Thanks so much!
Ruth

Take a look at a recent thread on the Cottage Garden Forum for some ideas. Lots of pictures there. Something like Bloominganne's walkway--about half way down the page, the one with the schnauzer--would look good on your property, imo.

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: What about your paths

Thanks so much treelover. That was some great inspiration. I love the path that you had posted and also the one that BloomingAnne did. Those are definitely more along the lines of what I was looking to do.