Hardiness zones can be misleading. 8b means that the area experiences average low winter temps of 15-20 degrees F, but it tells nothing about the high temps and summer conditions, and the suitability of a warm season grasses. Most of Great Britain is 8 or higher, with some coastal areas being 10a, same as areas in South Florida, and the deep southwest, but I think you will agree the two areas in summer are vastly different, and you should never grow Bermuda in Great Britain. Coastal British Columbia benefits from warm Pacific currents that keep the winters relatively mild, but summers are also mild to warm, the same as our pacific northwest. Any cool season grass would be acceptable where you live, the amount of sun is going to be the main issue with your choice. How many hours of direct sun does the area get on a typical cloudless summer day?

Actually, I just remembered a long time ago my friend had a California fan palm in his back yard, and it was grown locally from seed. I believe it was in the ground for quiet a few years and it was well established. It pulled through the winters unprotected, but his neighbor hood "code" made him cut it down because it still had the beard on it and even when pruned they still did not like it, he was not so happy about that. But I think I will be going with the California fan palm. Our winters are dry and it only gets really cold here for about 2 weeks until it starts to warm up. I'll give it a try!

I live in Jacksonville zone 9A, only a few miles southeast of the 8b border. I have an orange tree and a ruby red grapefruit tree that have both survived 9 degree nights (I checked the weather records, the trees are at least 25 years old, so I was able to look up the lowest temps they'd been exposed to.) Most winters we will drop into the mid 20's to upper 20's for at least a week at night, with an occasional drop into the teens that happens once every few years. My neighbor has a tree of a similar age, it is a swingle citrumelo now because the scion froze and only the rootstock survived. The reason why my trees are alive is because they are on their own roots. They are not grafted, someone grew them from a seed. When the tree is ungrafted, unless the earth the roots are in freezes solid, they will come back from the roots even if everything above ground is killed off. I would recommend experimenting with rooted cuttings of anything you'd like. Seeds may be better, I think you'll be more likely to find something that can live on its own, but they will not fruit for 5-10 years, so it depends on your patience. I think just fruits and exotics sells certain types of citrus ungrafted, they sold me a variegated eureka lemon and said those worked better with no rootstock. Many of your plants will die due to the soil conditions on your property. Those that can tolerate your soil should be planted on the south side of your house, and frame protected when young. When they get too big for that, just watering them well before a freeze should save them 95% of the time. The difficult part will be finding something that can grow in your soil with no graft. Once you do, the cold is much less of a problem than for a grafted tree. One warning-- most citrus is dwarfed by the rootstock, my ungrafted grapefruit is 25 feet tall and about 15 feet wide. Think about space considerations and the eventual spread of the canopy and roots when planting close to your house, as citrus roots can be invasive.

"As a gardener I am worried that I will just plant things and not have them create the finished look I'm hoping for." This is exactly what will happen if work proceeds without a comprehensive plan! The drawing is a good start for something to add measurements to in order that you can plot it out accurately on graph paper. As Gardengal mentioned, it needs to be to scale, so someone preparing to figure out what will fit ... will know if it will fit. One can also see all the bed shapes at a glance and know that they are compatible with one another and use good geometry for their lines. There is a tendency for drawings drawn by those who don't do it regularly to become very cluttered and hard to read, so I'd suggest you leave out everything extraneous and draw only the necessary: buildings, fences, curbs, landscape walls, walks, drive, tree trunks, AC, etc. Label plants at the edge of the drawing and use a thin line to connect it's name to the plant. The initial plan is a base plan. It shows only permanent existing features. Proposed features will come later on a copy. I was trying to reconcile one of your photos (left side of house) with the plan. The curb should be drawn in so we can see where the yard ends and know that there's a street over there. I see a birch tree in the pic but not on the plan. Is it being removed? The triangular raised bed does not look good. If you plan to get rid of it, don't show it on the plan. If you don't plan to get rid of it ... why? Dimensional lumber raised beds are typically for back yard and growing vegetables. For front yard and landscaping why would you want one? Not using one will generally look and work better. If you're going to create a high dollar raised bed out of brick or stone it would be different. Otherwise, I'd leave it out. The plan calls out roses, peonies, irises, etc. but is not showing any on the plan. Do these things exist, or are they simply desired? If the former, their beds should be shown. If the latter, they should not be shown or labeled on the base plan. Draw the fence and call it out only as "fence" without using any additional arrows. If the picket fence will be in a different location, leave the fence out for now. The stepping stones seems like their path would be subject to changing in a new plan. I would leave them out for now. If there was foundation planting at the house and any planting along fence (which looks like their direction you're leaning) then the stepping stone path would probably only fit somewhere near the center line of the space between house and garage. It's a fairly skinny area and plants take up room. Right now the path is headed square into a patch of grapevines so that doesn't seem like a good walking experience. For the time being, I wouldn't think of plants. Just think of the hardscape portions of the project: walks, fences, drive, beds, etc.