MPG, yes, cut the large arborvitae down around the front doorway, and keep the ones in the backyard. You might also think of removing a few more of the large ones near the garage. I think you can get away with removing half or 2/3 of them, leaving just few for your accent points. I'd take out the large green 'meatballs', and I think you would be fine not to replace them with anything. It looks like they were planted to screen the driveway and it's cars so people outside the yard couldn't see into the yard from the street. If you still feel the need to screen your driveway then think about placing shrubs and trees in the lawn area well off to the sides of the driveway. You have a formal French-Italian villa look to your home, I'd play that up with the choices you make for any additional plants you choose. Since you are in a dry climate, lavender, rosemary, herbs, and a few shrub-trees that look like the olive trees in the Mediterranean area. But do check out books that cover your drier climate. Every place has a palatte of plants that look the best for it's area. And think about painting the white trim on the house, and the trim around the garage a shade darker than the existing color the house is currently painted. If you don't like the house color then, when you remove the large arborvitae, it that would be a great time to repaint. Whatever color you decide on, you would do the same thing, you would paint the details in a slightly darker shade of the main color so they stand out just a bit, almost like a shadow. And when you do remove the plant material, you will have to slice through and loosen them from the foundation before you have them pulled. They have sent roots under your foundation if you are on a slab. You will have to grub out the old plants' roots, and add more soil to those areas where you have taken the plants out since they have used up all the organic matter and all the nutrients. Cruise through magazines and garden books, focus on homes that look similar to your's to see how that style is enhanced with plants. It's not always very formal, the rustic Italian farmhouse and the extremely formal French city villa are miles apart. And check things out through interlibrary loans from your local library if garden books are few in number. Go ahead and remove the extra plant materials, and amend the places well ahead of anything going back in, and take your time living with the blank canvas so you can visualize any new ideas better. I think you have a fantastic project ahead of you, have fun!

There are a number of ways to make keeping your pond maintenance more efficient without the outrageous price your handyman puts on the job. The first problem of fine leaved Honey Locust leaves could be solved by making a screen sided or mesh sided basket to put into the top section of the pond to collect the leaves. Just leave it in place between cleanings. If you are handy, the screen sided bucket is simple enough but premade mesh fish nets come in some rather large sizes and shaping the handle to serve as a cup type handle is easy enough as is making some sort of shelf to hold the net in place. Just lift the net out by the handle, let the water drain back if it is sufficiently clear and dump the leaves out. I am putting in a link for a website that happens to show several products on the same page that would do a good job of cleaning the mulm under the bottom drain. The fish capture nets are there, too. The Muck Vac is about as simple as it gets. The price is a bit steep but it works. All you need is 50 lbs water pressure in the hose. The leaf vac uses a bag to catch debris and I use one to collect leaves on the bottom. It isn't as good for mulm unless you get the extra bags for that purpose. The price is hard to beat. It adds water to your pond so prepare as for a water change. The Python pond vac is a more elaborate version of the Muck vac designed to collect leaves and mulm. It is more difficult to get into tight places and I have a problem opening and closing the jar that collects the debris because my hands hurt a lot. The pond vacuum on this page is pretty expensive but you can get a garage(utility)vac with a continuous flow(water)discharge for between $75 and $90. It works, too. Just add a hose to run the water to the garden. I got one at Walmart and I've seen them at Lowes, Menards, etc. It took me a while to get the hang of it but Horton came through for me with proper instructions. UV, UV. Hum-mm. I don't see anywhere the flow rate would be low enough to let the UV work. I see you have valves all through the system that makes in-line space at a premium even if it lets you adjust the flow. It seems to me that adding another pipe with a valve to control that flow would make the system complicated to the point of maintenance inefficiency and it would certainly raise the scream level. Maybe I am wrong. Since you are going to move, I would use a small submersible pump and a stand alone UV + filter. It might even be possible to get by with only the sponge included prefilter to protect the pump. The object is to increase dwell time to allow the UV time to work. You can get small fountain pumps for cheap. Try Harbour Freight.I found the UV and filter from Laguna on sale for 45 bucks. several years ago. That screwdriver must be a sign of ingenuity or ineptitude. I don't know which. One of these days you will laugh at it. In a number of stores I see wire shelves that are stackable in the laundry and storage departments. I don't see how deep the hole is but I bet you could find one of those shelves that would fit close enough. You might need to do a bit of bending or cutting. Please do not put stones on the bottom of the pond. It will make cleaning an impossible task and eventually the water will become stinky. Now I will let the smart guys take over. I still like your pond. Sandy Here is a link that might be useful: Simple inexpensive ideas that work well

Hi Megan, You might find Amy Padgett's website on her roses useful there (link attached). She lives in Eastern NC, zone 8, and you might well have good experiences in Eastern SC with some of the same roses she likes in her no-spray yard. Specifically, she highly recommends both Souvenir de la Malmaison and Old Blush as favorite roses that are especially easy to grow and good for beginners. Not that you're a beginner, but that ought to be yet another clue that a rose will do well without a lot of fussing over it and spraying. Your list has so many roses that I either have or want that perhaps some that I happen to like might also appeal to you: General Gallieni. Needs room. Lovely fragrance to the attractive red blooms with lighter reverse sides. Can take a bit of shade, like many other teas. Grows horizontally like a rambler the first year, but then grows upwards. Evergreen. General Schablikine. Lovely blooms on an attractive plant that doesn't get as large as many teas do. Blooms that are good for cutting start early and continue into the early winter. Evergreen. Moonlight, the hybrid musk. Nice flowers, good for cutting, flexible stems. It held onto its leaves all winter, in a colder than average winter, and is doing great/blooming now. Very shade tolerant. It was evergreen here in zone 7. Ghislaine de Feligonde. If you have the space for it, this is a worry-free rose that's also shade tolerant. I especially like the looks of its foliage; it reminds me slightly of fern foliage. Our new one (planted last fall) hasn't quite opened its buds yet but it's absolutely covered in buds. Very bushy, but also can be used as a short climber. Evergreen. Crepuscle. We just got this one but everything I can find out about it for NC/SC (and plenty of other warm areas besides) is very positive for use as a short climber for a no-spray yard. Some shade tolerance. Amazone. We just got this one too. It was found in Bermuda, where there is plenty of humidity, so it should do well in NC/SC. If you read Help Me Find on this one, and you'll want to order it. It's pretty vigorous here thus far. Some shade tolerance. Spice. Also found in Bermuda, and new here too. Lion's Fairy Tale. We are taking a chance on this one for no-spray. It's new this spring, but once it came it bowled me over with the beauty of its huge blooms; I'm glad to be taking the chance on it. The plant will stay relatively small and can fit nicely into the front of a large planting. Gruss An Aachen. Our three did extremely well even in an amount of direct sunlight that's less than ideal. They love to bloom from early to late in the season, and the blooms are luscious. Others in other areas of the east coast report problems with disease. Ours did get a little powdery mildew a few times but hosing it down a few times worked just fine. No very noticeable blackspot problems. Ours came from Chamblees and I don't know whether their particular cultivar is any different from others, but we were thrilled with those roses (until they got Rose Rosette Disease so we had to toss them). We are going to replace them with more Gruss An Aachens. Good shade tolerance. Not quite evergreen in zone 7. Westside Road Cream Tea. This is a tea rose found in California that grows slowly and doesn't get large. There are lots of uses for small tea roses, so I hope our new plants do well. They came as bands and are still tiny, tiny, tiny at this moment. Rise 'n' Shine. New here. A heavy bloomer that's a good yellow fading to light yellow; the entire effect is quite attractive. Rose Rosette. A tiny pure pink rose that looks perfect in every way. (Imagine a tiny version of your Belinda's Dream.) Good for cutting long-lasting blooms. David Austin's Mortimer Sackler. No-spray here, though we've had to replace them due to RRD. A delicately beautiful pink rose with some fragrance. Can be used as a short climber and it seems a natural for that kind of use; the canes are extremely flexible. Mostly evergreen in zone 7. Red Cascade. We haven't tried this miniature climber/rambler by Ralph Moore, but I'd like to one of these days if I could find a sunny enough place for it. It looks wonderful to me, though I don't know whether anyone in the Carolinas has tried it. Anyway, Antique Rose Emporium sells it. Best wishes, Mary Here is a link that might be useful: Amy Padgett's roses in eastern NC

Hot Cocoa is relatively disease resistant, it may get some anthracnose (a fungal disease) late in the season, but not horrible. Synthetic fungicides are applied as per the directions on the container. Most have a 7 - 14 day cycle. Bayer Advanced Disease Control for Roses, Flowers, and Shrubs is popular with those here on the forum who use a fungicide regularly. Heirloom sells small plants (rooted cuttings), so they need a little extra care. They may need to be put into a little larger pot, and kept in dappled shade until they harden off. They can't be exposed to direct sunlight right out of the box, the leaves will fry. A couple of weeks in dapples shade, and gradual exposure to direct sunlight will harden them off.