Vettin: This is an incredible list. It's way too big for only 10. I'll give you some items that stand out to me as either easy or special favorites of mine. Buddleia--butterfly bush--large fragrant clusters of small blooms. Can get to be large. I love mine. Campanula--if I lived where you do, I would definitly try some of these. The kind of fizzle in the heat here but I think they could work for you. Called "bellflower", they are beautiful plants. Clematis--I have several. look into these and take your garden vertically. They look great with climbing roses or beautiful by themselves. Coreopsis--called "tickseed", they look a lot like daisies. They are easy to grow and bloom very well. A great group of plants. Delphinium--I love these but can't grow them because they don't like my heat. I've heard of others in N. VA who do well with them. GET SOME OF THESE! Dianthus--carnations are in this family. They bloom well and smell great. The ones I grow are rather low growing and great in the garden. Digitalis (foxglove)--Nice tall plant with really pretty bell shaped flowers. They are tall and narrow and add a differnt look and texture to a garden. Edgeworthia--This plant blooms in winter with incredibly fragrant blooms that look a lot like Daphne. The Atlanta Bontanical Gardens have several. They are unique looking and well worth the garden space for the winter blooms. Helleborus--another winter bloomer. EASY plants that take no care and can spread so you can share with your friends. Hosta--a VERY low care EASY plant for a shady area. The clump gets larger and had to be "thinned" every few years but that means you can spread them around. Several of these varieties are nice. Hydrangea--look at the two arborescens. I like these. Beautiful huge clusters of white blooms. Iris--a great EASY plant. Don't plant them deeply at all--almost on the surface or they won't bloom or worse, will rot. I recognize two Iris germanica (bearded irs) as being rebloomers--they bloom in the spring AND fall--Lo How Sliver (white) and Sugar Blues (blue and fragrant). Get at least one of each of these and look up the others to see what they are. Lithodora--a very low growing plant with bright blue star shaped flowers. The foliage is dark green. I really like this plant. Osmanthus fragrans--I did not realize that this plant was hardy in N. VA. If it is, GET AT LEAST ONE! It's evergreen, slow growing, can get 15 feet tall but will tolerate pruning. I keep mine at about 6 feet. Mine bloom in the spring and fall with scattered bloom in the summer. The blooms are tiny and you don't really notice them until you SMELL them. The fragrance carries across the yard and it's incredible. This is one of my favorite plants (and it's not even a rose). Philidelphus--mock orange. Beautiful white blooms in the late spring for me. The frangrance is wonderful. Phlox--there are several different kinds listed. All are great plants in my garden. They give a good selections of colors and they are easy plants. Rudbeckia--black eyed susans--nice sunny cheerful plant easy and blooms for a long time. Salvia--good plants--easy and pretty Scabiosa--pincushion flower--I have butterfly blue and it is one of the best blooming plants I own. The little blue/lavender blooms--about 1 1/2 in. across come from early spring to frost. Easy, easy plant. It's kind of low growing with stems that stick up with the bloom on top. A very nice plant. Hope this helps. Remember, this is just my opinion and I am not in your zone. I also looked at the list quickly and may have missed something wonderful. Enjoy the sale. Take a lot of $ and a truck to carry everything home. Let us know what you end up getting.

True_blue, 'John Davis' will bloom again on new wood, though the second "flush" generally isn't very significant. In order to climb, this rose NEEDS deeply dug fertile soil and feeding, otherwise you'll just end up with a shrub, but an attractive one at that. 'JD' can take zone 3 cold, but the biggest challenge is dealing with winter desiccation drying up the stems. Alberta (central Alberta included) will at times experience amazingly BALMY winter temps and the reflected heat from buildings will only further intensify and desiccate this rose. So, I water deeply prior to freeze up and attempt to lean 'JD' away from the house ... it's a challenge to get almost any rose to climb in our cold prairie climate. 'Olds Collage Rose' looks especially nice, thanks for posting vstapes :)

Husband and I actually found an open house in the area I want. Someone bought it a few years ago for an investment and did a horrible remodel for a flip. Of course the price reflects the so called remodel. What a shame! The setting of the house is real pretty with lots of mature trees and tropical foliage. I think the house was built in 58'. The bedrooms are small but ok, it has a fireplace and pool, patio, two car garage and a nice layout. The agent is one of the popular ones in that area. I gave him my scoop about our future listing and what we were looking to buy as well as our emails ect. The guy was very honest with me when I asked for the new listings to my email before they hit mls online. He said he had a lot of investors that he deals with. I said I would like a crack at the listings they get (thanks Lukk for arming me). He made some sort of comment to the affect that they are priority. I said, you mean I come after them? He said, well lets see, I have five to seven regulars that I get repeat cash sales so what do you think? Me,...here we go again! I'm going to have to do some serious aggression to get a house in that area and get one that was not destroyed with eekkk remodel. That's ok though because I have no shame when it comes to muscling in. I know a little about HUD. My son just bought his townhome through HUD. It took him six months to close. It took the whole family working daily to keep it on track and deal with all the paper work. I think part of the nightmare was due to the 203k (?) loan with the repairs wrapped up in his mortgage and one of the few mortgage companies that did that sort of loan. What a mess, son went through three different people in charge of his case and two managers. They all kept leaving for Wells Fargo. We helped him look and it took over 6 months just to get a crack at something in his price range. Like I said above the only reason he got it is because of the stipulation in the neighborhood where you have to live there a year before renting it out and the fact that it was HUD. Investors didn't have a chance at that one but there were close to 200 people interested. We got the listing fresh off the press by mistake when a realtor we were dealing with sent it to his investors lol. My son put in a bid $5,500 over list and got it. Don't get me wrong, there are deals to be had everywhere down here. Just not in the very best areas unless you have a connection and cash. Or, you want to pay top dollar. Although places are appraising rather low now so that part could come out in the wash. A connection is key though. About the other house husband loved the look of in a near by to my fav neighborhood. Well, it was about a hundred thousand more than he waned to spend. I then made him drive around in neighborhoods in "his" price range. No way he would live there. I'm making progress. Really though, I too want to find a deal so I'm not looking to go crazy. I do want something I can make nice in a decent area though. Ollie, I'm with you on established neighborhood with trees!!! Some of the roads I'm hoping to find a little house on in my preferred neighborhood are not necessarily the nicest roads. However, the reason I like some of those roads is because they have an abundance of natural tropical foliage and trees with older homes. I love the old Florida feel. There is not much of that left around here and I pine for it.

Patty, Julia has been a workhorse here, even in the not best conditions, some morning shade and mid-day sun, then shade then late afternoon sun, 4 1/2 of sun hours tops but she still keeps blooming. Thanks for the heads-up on disease the first couple of years new Austins have been disease disasters this year. Maybe year three (next year) will be the year I'll see an improvement? One can hope. I'll be ordering her roses and suggesting the best for her to pick from. Luckily she doesn't mind if they lack scent. This gives her a lot more choices. They'll definitely be own root. winter hardiness is definitely a concern. I have Peter Kulkielski's book 'Chemical Free Roses' for reference plus the wealth of information and knowledge from the rose forum community so I'm sure we'll find something that will provide lots of beauty without a lot of stress.