Thanks to all of you for your kind words. For Newbie, These beds are all about 5 yrs. old. We had many trees on this lot when we bought the place 31 yrs ago. They were immature at the time. Who knew? We were very young. We had 2 pre-schoolers back then and little time for landscaping. I was lucky to have DH mow the lawn once a week. As the years passed those trees (8 maples, 2 birches, a flowering crab apple, and various and assorted evergreens) grew to canopy almost the entire property. One beautiful maple covered my entire front lawn. You couldn't even see the house from the road. 5 yrs ago we decided to come out of the dark and into the light and had those trees mentioned above removed. We still have many large trees at the bottom rear of the backyard. The fact that tree roots extended from the property line on one side to the property line on the other made it impossible to maintain any decent kind of lawn. Even weeds were unsuccessful. I had tried many different plants, numerous rose bushes, and a sundry of shrubs. Most died. Many survived but did't thrive. The first year following the tree removal the few shrubs and tiny hostas remaining in the landscape grew to what seemed like prehistoric proportions. They simply needed more sun. As a result, everything you see was planted by my tiny little hands. It would seem I was trying to fulfill my lifelong desire for a colorful garden in very short order. It is not difficult nor particularly time consuming to maintain. The daylilies are my favorite plants and I anticipate their blooming every year, but they do require deadheading every day to keep them tidy looking. Not difficult. But early every morning, I grab my pail and have the opportunity to reaquaint myself with each and every plant while performing what might otherwise be a tedious chore. It provides me with the information on what may need attention such as fall division, additional water, a little tender loving pruning. I love it all. This was originally posted so I could provide a little bit of background on the layout of the beds. I will be posting individual plant photos soon. Thanks again, Liz P

It's a real swamp around here (Tulsa). A few people have tried to mow but just leave deep ruts in their yards. Your yard looks wonderful, but of course it could use a few more daylilies (and my other preferred flower - roses)-LOL. Happy 4th to you. May it be a sunny one for both of us.

My suggestions are to mainly to simplify and embolden... Remove the low-starting, wide spreading limbs off of the two front trees. Create a bed of single variety plants below those trees. Increase the bed size at the left corner of the house and move the small tree in it farther away from the house. Increase the foundation bed front-to-back depth where possible (to the 6' range or greater.) Paint the lower portion of the power pole in some interesting scheme. Add an island with small tree in front of the breezeway area. Remove the pyramidal shaped plants flanking front door and replace with beds of annual color. Underscore the left set of windows with the existing shrubs, but don't let them extend beyond the end of house. Underscore the bay window with a single planting that will not obscure the window lower portions. Widen the front walk. Does not need to be exact same material. Anything compatible will do. Same material could form cheekwall at single step. Or get rid of that single step. It does not look needed. (Can't tell if existing bricks are laid OK, but the weeds growing in them should be sprayed out for an improved appearance. A canopy or awning of some type above the stoop would make the house face much more interesting. PS: Thanks for putting on decent pictures ... one of the extremely few times I have not wished for better!

How about some blue grey salvia? It looks like the area gets a lot of sun. Where is this house located? I would try some things that aren't as blocky looking -- taller plants that might move a little with the wind - things like toadflax , or some other smaller plants with spires and cloudy appearance to foliage ... (green grey, blue grey)