You can physically have a lawn on a 10% slope, but I wouldn't recommend it, and leveling this off to create a more gentle slope would help the lawn act as the anchor to the surrounding plantings, or emphasize the terrace aspect. You have so many great public botanic gardens in the triangle area of North Carolina, that I got a chance to see this last May, and I think visiting them to get design ideas could help you alot. You might also find that you will get more relevant design feedback if you could perhaps scan your proposed ideas in plan, with your ideas superimposed. Verbal explanations are all well and good, but with a property this size it is hard for someone not there and familiar with your property to get a good sense of what you have in mind. Have you also considered a follow up consultation with the designer to flesh out the concept? I wouldn't be afraid to ask him to consider fresh ideas you may have, but the original design may have more continuity if it is fleshed out abit. As to snappish replies from the design pro's on this site, maybe they are suffering from cabin fever this time of year, as afterall, Iowa, Cape Cod and Quebec are not the most pleasant places to be gardening this time of year, and they may be sick of all the relatives over the holidays! While I admire the fortitude to stick with that type of severe winter year after year, I can't quite imagine having to actually endure it. It would be difficult for me to really give valid design input on such a large lot in such different climatic conditions, without actually visiting the site. Breaking down your requests for input and feedback might more realistically generate better replies if they were more specific and detailed and based on your ideas, rather than being open ended...

Kay- Thats correct. Daffs on top, going down 2 of daylilies and TB Iris at the bottom. So I haven't moved any thing in yet. I went out and seriously measured and then had my list of what I wanted there and figguired out the order/placement of what I want. After it was done the other day the thought passed thru my head that each one should have been a block longer. Sure enough, to put everything I want, each one needs to be a block longer. So I will start and put the first daylilies in and then see if I want to wait to do the extentions until the fall or call them back as soon as possible. They don't actually HAVE to be longer, I could just put one less daylily in each. So I just have to think about this. Things never seem to be simple around here.

Jean - Thanks. I knew that the new daylilies in the planterbox would not do much this spring. But I can just immagine it in my mind that it will be looking fanastic next bloom season. Andrea- I have six butterfly bushes and I cut them way, way back early each spring. Otherwise they would take over the world. This is actually one of the smaller butterfly bushes but my favorite color of the ones that I have. Vickie- That row of hedges on the left side I put in about 6 years ago. The half round planterboxes (at least the big ones) were there for afew years. Otherwise I started that left side last spring. I put that low stacked stone retaining wall in last spring that runs accross the entire front. On the right side, the topmost curved terrace was done in 2007 and the daylilies and roses in that terrace section went in that spring. The foribundaville rose garden on the right was already there, at least it was started but not as finished as it is now. The planterbox went in last fall and was only planted this spring. Cindy- I can not plant anything in the sidwalk strip. First off dog walkers many times each day. Fortunately we have a pooper scooper law here. Second cars park all along in front of the house constantly and if it were planted, it would be impossible to open the passenger door and step out. We have a 16 acre park directly accross the street for where I am. There are no nightbors on the other side of the street. There are however, lots of walkers and cars that slow down to look at the garden.

One thing was that I just could not stand the jumble of daylilies stuck over there on the other side. Of course it had been like that for years. But after I had this side done with the mini terraces and replanted with daylilies, I liked it so much I wanted to straighten out the other side too. So I had decided to go ahead with at least the two lines accross and had gotten a price for that. That would have been labor and material to continue from what was already there. But since he messed this up, he couldn't continue from whats already there and it all has to be redone. So it's going to be knocked out and the entire thing from sctatch but I only pay for the new part as price agreed. Because it really was his mess up. This was the area I was out digging and tossing daylilies at the other day. I moved afew (about five) and tossed about 15 that were just a struggling mess of not doing nothing. Now I have a big tub of daylily clumps that mostly had been there for years that I will replant in that area once everything is done. I had also dug up oriental lilies that have been declining for years. Couldn't figgure out why until I saw how deep the bublets were. This was the first big planting of lilies I did years ago and I now realise I planted them too deep. The bulbs were too small. So I decided I was going to toss them and get new bulbs in the sping to plant. So he wanted the bulbs I was going to toss so I gave them to him. The guy already has a garden full of my reject roses as I give him any roses I dig up when I want to replace with new ones. One of the things he did yesterday was cut down the dead part of the serviceberry tree that died in the heat wave this summer. It has multi trunks and only the one died but it was the biggest one. Poor tree looks anemic without that part but I am hoping it fills in as I really like it. Sadly, I have to dig up the daylilies I had planted in the mini terraces already and that are really looking good in their new home. I will just take lots of dirt with the rootball and set them aside in the sade and replant when this is done. Meantimew I had two boxed of new iris show up at the end of the week (small orders) and still have them to plant. Some of these TB Iris are planned to go in front of the old part of the mini terrace section. Well, I guess it will all be fine once its finished. I do know what I want in front there and how I plan to lay it out and what goes there.