About 40 miles north of mtnrdredux, we had just snow. I was sad to see my birch out back look like this - A bit to the right - And while I was making the dinner for my friend Jimmy to take to his father and grandmother 2.5 hours north, he was snow blowing paths and the driveway for me. Thank-you, Jimmy! He also gently knocked the snow off the birch for me, and it bounced back, but I lost a Japanese Maple planted this fall.

Those are beautiful. I so enjoyed looking at them. NO snow where I'm from. Snow is a rarety........so I thoroughly enjoy seeing everyone elses snow pics. THANKS for sharing.

Ah,yes,I remember my 1st 38 yrs. in NE OH & SW PA. I remember, as a kid, my dad getting an icicle hitting his hand requiring stitches. I remember black ice, SHOVELING, sliding through stop signs, tires frozen to the pavement. I've been in the south for 20 yrs. and it would take about an act of God for me to move north again. It was (unusually & WAY above normal) 82 here yesterday (but a cold front came in & knocked us back down to a below normal high of 58 today.) And it sure doesn't feel like Christmas. I LOVE the pics. I miss how pretty it is with snow and ice. But I sure don't miss slipping in the driveway and wrenching my back. Y'all are a HARDY bunch! I've wimped out. Hope ds4 wasn't hurt.

You are trying to force a tree-like shrub to be a rather squat dome, with predictable results. If you already think it's too big maybe you need to take it out and plant something else there - star magnolias grow a lot bigger than this one is now. A good proportion is shrubs being 2 1/2 times the height a bed is wide at the point the shrubs are planted (beds often have informal shapes that vary in width at different points; for the whole to look cohesive shorter plants should be used in the narrower parts and taller plants put in the wider sections). So if the bed there is 3' deep then a shrub about 7 1/2' high is called for. Many people might even plant an umbrella shaped tree in that spot to form a canopy over the terrace - but the existing bed is really too small for such a combination to look in proportion.