I know pictures can look very different than the real situation but it looks like the soil is very bad and dry. Tree roots could be the problem. If that is your problem have you considered hardscape?

A pretty bird bath, or a decorative urn with some shade annuals, a decorative urn with some shade annuals like white impatients surrounded with variegated vinca or my new favorite rozanne geranium.

If it is not tree root problem I would improve the soil and plant heucheras (coral bells).

Hi,

The trees are some distance away. I didn't encounter any tree root when I was digging.

The soil is dry right now because of several days of 95 degree weather. It's actually black and has quite a bit of earthworms. I'll take a look at coral bells.

Thanks for your help!

Paul

I would plant Hosta, Ferns(lady in red, japanese painted), astilbe, heuchera.

I love coral bells (heuchera) but a nice big hosta would look good there too.

Can you tell me the name of the light green leafed, low plant growing to the left of the picture? Looks really nice.

Hosta, ferns, huechera, dicentra (bleeding hearts)

njmomma,

I don't know what the plant is, I didn't plant it there, but from flipping through the book, it may be a variegated gout weed. If that's the case, that would be very depressing, since gout weed are actually very invasive while that particular plant is just growing slowly which may mean nothing will grow there.

I was thinking of bleeding hearts, too but it's too late to plant those.

Paul

I would suggest your little plant is likely lamium.......does it flower at all?
Can you give us a closer pic of it?
Flora

Hi Flora,

I asked the person who planted it. she said she doesn't know what it is and is some common sort of evergreen shrub. It remains green in the winter. Here's a closer picture.

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Paul

That looks to me like variegated euonymus which is a really slow-growing evergreen that does well in shade. My soil is very acidic (sorry, don't know the pH) + I have a lot of shade and it grows well where I am.

In addition to what's been suggested so far, brunnera, lady's mantle, carex/sedge, snakeroot, toad lily, Lenten rose/hellebore, pulmonaria, columbine, persicaria & Virginia bluebells are all thriving in my full shade area. Astilbes like moist soil but all mine survived last year's extended drought and are back this year as if nothing happened. Same with the hydrangea & weigela planted nearby--they looked pretty bad by August last year but all have returned again unfazed. The weigela really shot up and has nearly doubled in size since 2010--I actually pruned it back yesterday and put the cuttings in a big jelly jar of water.

There are a couple of Hostas that would echo the euonymus, definitely not goutweed from the picture.

I would suggest lamium anne greenway and lamiastrum herman's pride as ground cover to go with the hostas, heucheras.