I found this nice list of ferns. Hardy Ferns

The Hydrangeas sound like a good idea.

Since all structures and paths are so low to the ground, I'd plant only very low, shade loving plants. If deer are not a problem, you have endless choices with hostas. If deer are a problem, look at pulmonaria (somewhat hosta like), lamiums, perhaps Cimicifugas (now Actea, I think), which have low foliage but tall blooms that are airy and see through, Epimediums, etc.

Heuchera villosa cultivars like 'Caramel' would work, along with Hydrangea arborescens, both natives, and some Autumn Fern for evergreen coverage. If deer are an issue, can switch to Hydrangea Macrophylla 'Endless Summer' or 'Nikko Blue'.

Deer love hydrangeas and don't care a fig about species or cultivars - they will munch on Endless Summer and Nikko Blue just as well as any other variety. Ask me how I know :-))

Nice pics but I believe the OP said she has shade.

I disagree on the pic being nice. The over saturated picture above makes the plants look like plastic. The post is not relevant to the question as as far as I'm concerned it's nothing more than an advertisement, and a poor one at that. I doubt sun and drought tolerant plants are a primary concern in this case. It's the north side of a house in New Hampshire.

The placement of the plants shows me a case of 'even space-itis', more common with rock positioning than plants. Why are all the rocks in the 'stream bed' the same size? Why are plants placed in front of the boulders? Do they need to be hidden?! Pros should be able to do much better, even in Poway.

Kaitlin,
The first thing I would do is enlarge the bed, it's too small
proportionally to the house and limits your choices as to what can be
used. I would also pretty much stick with evergreens next to the house and deck. Deciduous plants
used in a foundation situation don't do the job in winter. The gaps,
when used with evergreens looks like missing teeth to me, snow or otherwise.

I used to design and install a lot of yard makeovers as well as new garden construction. As a landscaper, I would kill the lawn, till it in, throw the edges in toward the back of the middle and cover the whole area with trucked in topsoil, leaving it low around the edges to make room for the mulch. Now you can plant, and the digging is fast and easy!

I would have evergreen plants about waist high around most of the deck with something taller where it meets the sidewalk. Those plants can act as a railing for the deck on the deck side. On the side facing the driveway I would plant those 'railing plants' several deep so as to appear as a drift instead of a hedge. That gives the bed some visual flow and can be enhanced from there by adding different plants to enlarge the drift and conform to the shape of the bed.

In front of the glassed in area I would take a different approach and design the area looking at it from the inside. Lower evergreen shrubs next to the glass in the middle and a little taller on the edges. There's room for a small deciduous tree out in front of the glass a ways and another on either side, one being on the other side of the walk. Those trees should have an interesting branching form for Winter interest and good Fall color too. Japanese maples come to mind. :-) You don't want something that looks like a brush pile when the leaves are gone. (Lilac, Quince, etc.

An evergreen groundcover that can handle shade is a must in my book. It ties it together. The small leaved deciduous trees gives it shade further out in the sun in the summertime and the groundcover swallows the leaves in the Fall.

I'm not too familiar with what you can grow in your Zone, but I'm sure the people that are can help with plant selection. It's the concept is what I'm communicating.

Mike

miketann thank you for the suggestions. There is a 20-30ft tall low hanging tree of some sort just to the right of the picture, you can see the branches coming down in the middle of the first picture. I'm all for expanding the bed. That one was put in place because I was so sick of how it looked, I needed to do something fast. However, I'm not set on making the whole thing a bed, mostly because I'm not a fan of gardening in the first place and feel like that would be a lot of work. I do like the idea about creating a drift by the railing.