Ms Lu, Forget about all the dos and don'ts for a moment. I'll tell you what I do (and I'm not necessarily normal in my approaches) with every landscape design on an existing home. It evolved from being a necessary step for drawing a plan and became (to me) the most essential step in planning a landscape. It is to clear my head of any detail of what I might do and simply go out to the home and start to do an existing conditions plan. I know that you live there and believe you already know those existing conditions, but there are different levels of familiarity. A humorous analogy would be going to first base, second base, . of intimacy with the property. We all know that the more we do anything, the more we understand it and pick up on detail and remember it (whatever "it" is). This is no different with your landscape. The four bases of an existing conditions plan are measuring and photographing, recording your measurements in a sketch or diagram as you measure, and drafting the plan which is a two step process of reading measurements (and looking at the photos for confirmation) and the physical act of drawing it (the home run "theres no place like home, theres no place like home" ). That is a lot of work, but you will know and understand your site like you never have before. It puts you at "ground zero". Now you can move forward logically. You will, hopefully, be a lot less concerned with concepts such as "perimeteritis" or "negative space" and be more focused on what challenges you have to overcome. Some of those should be newly discovered while some you already knew about. . And you will have a base plan to start sketching in your proposed work. Here again is a place where you can work backward or forward. You want a place to sun bathe and enjoy your coffee -these are "activities". You want some privacy and not to be bothered by road noise these are "experiences". Ultimately, you need actual dimensioned physical space, structures, plants, etc, where you can do these activities with the desired experience these are the "requirements". You seem to be thinking backwards by first defining the physical requirements for the experience before the physical requirement for the activity. Glenda the Good Witch said "it is best to start at the beginning and then follow the yellow brick road". I agree. Your list of activities should grow as you do your existing conditions plan (passive activities are also activities). Certainly, you will become aware of more aesthetic issues that will need to be mitigated or enhanced along with the primary ones. Parking, arriving, maintaining, entering, exiting, viewing, bringing in the groceries, playing with the dog, . are all activities, all will yield an experience, and all have physical requirements. Start by planning the primary activities. Place those that are movable where they least conflict with other activities and near supportive activities. If you need a patio, put it in the plan before you think about screening it (opposite of your current thinking that is starting with the screening). Enhance that space (it may begin to screen it). The design will evolve. Just dont make the secondary physical requirement (the screening) become the primary activity and then have to then figure out how your primary activity is going to work within it. Build your landscape around what is important both philosophically and physically. Perimeters and negative space evolve within that bigger context. Starting with a "mixed border" that is "10 out and 56 long" is the same as designing a planting bed and then trying to figure out what to plant within it. Put on the ruby slippers and click your heals together.

I had to look and I think i found the thread in the weeds forum. I think this is it. I can understand that somebody might get upset at finding weeds growing through the mulch and could come to the conclusion that the seeds came from the mulch since different mulches had been used in the past. It's even possible that the weeds came from the mulch. I think the OP of that thread was prone to exaggeration. I'd hope so. Why would somebody buy 400 2 cf bags of mulch? That's almost 30 cu yds. That's a huge amount, and would take two or three large dump trucks to deliver in bulk. How many trips in a car or pickup truck would that take? Why would anybody buy that much mulch in small bags like that? As others have stated, it would be difficult to prove that the weeds came from the mulch and even if it did, I'm not sure there's any legal liability on the part of the vendor or the manufacturer. There may be laws regulating how many weed seeds can be in X amount of mulch, but if there aren't, I doubt if there's much legal recourse. I actually thought the manufacturer showed a lot of concern, offering to send somebody to the house to look into it. If the OP in that thread wanted to pursue a lawsuit, the OP would have to hire a lawyer to pursue the case. The lawyer would charge either a percentage of the settlement or an hourly fee. If the lawyer thought there was a good chance of winning the case and getting a substantial settlement, the initial offer would be for a percentage of the settlement. It would be a long time before the suit wended its way through the courts, but maybe a settlement could be worked out to avoid the hassle. If the lawyer thought there wasn't much chance of a big settlement, the hourly rate would likely be more than the settlement. Another option would be to find all those other outraged folks who thought they got weeds from the mulch and turning it into a class action lawsuit. Class action lawsuits are very lucrative, but usually only for the attorneys. They drag on for years and when they eventually settle, the final amount may be large, but any individual litigant is likely to get a very small payment. The bulk goes to the law firms. Some of it is in their percentage of the settlement. But there are other costs that go into the case (every piece of paper, every pen, every legal pad, ever phone call, every copy etc has a charge and this comes out of the plaintiffs' money after the attorneys' fees are already deducted). In the end, the "winners" may be able to buy a cup of coffee with their settlement (maybe not at Starbucks, though). And in case you're thinking that at least the manufacturer would be punished, the settlement would probably be a dollar figure that was very close to the liability insurance limit.

LOL, I've been guilty of ordering from Spring Hill before, so I'm not surprised. Filipendula rubra, Queen of the Prairie, should be hardy to zone 3, so that might survive - it does pretty well here, but I'm technically in zone 7. It does like water, as I just found out, about 10 years after planting it. IMHO, you should pray that the tradescantia is too tender; you may find yourself ripping it out (along with your hair) in years to come. Here, at least, it's ineradicable. I suppose by "grab bag" they mean "we randomly grab plants and shove them in a bag" - I hope they priced this selection accordingly!

Raeanne~This is already one spoiled baby! LOL She is the first grandbaby on both sides. She is only 6 hours from her DM's DPs so they get to see her way more often & of course they have done their share of spoiling. Of course, you wouldn't know that the DGSs weren't my biological ones b/c I spoil them as much or more. There is something about it--I just cannot help myself. We are going to babysit the youngest DGS while his momma is in school. That should be fun. (You should see the packages that we are taking for Valentine's Day for all 3 & then DGS #1's b'day is on Valentine's Day. Close to DeeMarie's! Please remember my DS on the 8th. That is when she has her surgery. They are going through the front of her neck to remove a vertabra & there is a slight chance that she might not make it & a slight chance that she would not be able to speak again. Dee~Sorry that you are under the weather. That is never any fun. I'll try to get back on here tomorrow before the Super Bowl starts--if I have finished with my packing. I have most of it done but am waiting on some clothes to dry. Since we have to go to a laundromat, I don't like to have my clothes dried there & prefer to have them hung up to dry. Have a Super day everyone--you must be since nobody is posting. :) Patti