It sounds like budget will keep most things from happening, but at least you can have goals and get to what you can. Trimming of trees is a lot easier/less costly if one keeps up with it and ANTICIPATES what's to come. 1.) A branch that's 10" in diameter is hard, time consuming and troublesome to cut. That same branch was once only 1" in diameter and could have been removed in about 10 seconds. 2.) As branches grow longer and thicker they hang down further. So branches that are only 4 or 5' off of a roof now, will be resting on it in a year or two. 3.)There's a store of energy in a tree that is in relative balance between foliage and roots. When the roots contain a surplus of energy relative to the foliage, the foliage will have a growth spurt. (For example, if one cut off all the foliage, the tree would have a major growth spurt. I'm not suggesting do this.) However, the growth spurt will most likely not to be channeled into what was cut... but in what remains. Therefore, A tree can be shaped much better, faster, and more efficiently (less waste of the stored energy) if it is pruned judiciously right along from babyhood. The wrong way is to let it get too out of bounds in places and ways it shouldn't, and then try to fix it long after it was needed. I understand that you are using the maple tree to solve a problem, but it looks like a case of using a hammer to kill mosquitoes. Why not consider some sort of screen close to, and wrapping the corner of the lot that will obscure traffic? It could possibly be combined with fencing that was mentioned earlier. I'm thinking along the lines of lattice or some kind of grill work with wines growing on it or some such thing. There's lots of possibilities. Just a thought. Hopefully, you don't want to grow the globe arborvitae as two separate balls. The house does not seem to be asking for any. I'd move the right-most globe leftward, as shown, to at least give these hope of growing together. The Euonymus coloratus is the shaggy reddish plant. I'd move it over to the Maple and start making groundcover out of it. I've marked up one of your pictures to suggest a bed line. And to show where you should have pruned the Maple.

For the last 12 years, my plants have had NO early morning direct sun, and NO late afternoon direct sun. My window for direct full sun has been from about 9 AM to 2 PM. My production is not as good as some who have more sunlight, but the taste is just as great. The areas that get less sunlight are where I plant early varieties like Siberian, SubArctic Plenty, Celebrity, etc. They seem to thrive and set fruit all summer long if they can get some shade. I put others like Giant Tree, Big Rainbow, Cherokee Purple, Supersteak, and such in the areas that get MY maximum direct sunlight time. I put others like Golden Jubilee and Better Boy in the middle ground. I found that if I limit the size of the container, it seems that the plants don't get so spindly as full sun depraved plants tend to do. I think we should not gripe or complain about shade, we should manage it. The experts out there may be able add facts such as sugar-conversions, disease susceptability, etc. Personally, I haven't had anything worse than an occasional hornworm for more than a decade. Of course, I got rid of most of the other wilts, and leaf diseases, and underground critters when I went to containers. I've recently opened up an area that will get about 8 hours of direct sun each day. That's why I've been looking for Heat-tolerant varieties. Here in Zone 7b northeast of HOT-LANTA, GA, heat, humidity, and temperatures are a huge problem. I fully appreciate that there are many areas that don't have this problem. My point is that when I started managing my shade (or my full sun time), raising tomatoes became fun again and less disappointing. So, I say write it down, SHADE IS GOOD!!!

You might want to look at Steve's Blinds. I learned of the website long ago here on GW and ordered several TDBU cellular shades. Steve's carries several manufacturers' products but we purchased "Steve's own" brand. I believe they are made by a subsidiary of Hunter Douglas but this may be incorrect. We already have several similar blinds in the Hunter Douglas brand and have found the Steve's product to be comparable in quality. Would definitely order from the company again. I am linking the results of a quick search on the website using made-up dimensions and specifying "Steve's own" brand. Please note that there are many other options available on the website, and you will need to carefully enter the particulars for your windows instead of relying on the numbers I used. There is an up-charge for the TDBU feature as well. The website is kind of junky and confusing but you can call and get some customer service assistance. Here is a link that might be useful: Steve's Blinds

Hi oldalgebra! I haven't put my kitchen on FKB - should I? I'm a newbie so wasn't sure if I was "worthy", LOL. Some details: - Cabinets: Merit cabinets in Whistler style, cherry wood with Truffle stain - Hardware: Ebay (gasp!) These are very heavy, great quality and a fraction of the cost of similar pulls I've seen in stores - Tile: Lunada Bay recycled glass tiles (Sumi-e style in Ohara Natural, 1x2 brick) Don't laugh, but I have more pictures/details on a Rate My Space page. I have a pretty low rating, but that's okay, I still like my kitchen :)