This book helped me out a lot when I wanted to expand our shade gardens. Year round interest is possible and foliage can be beautiful especially in your zone! In another garden we have everbearing strawberries that are partly shaded by fruit trees in summer, but produce a good 1st crop. If you have a sunnier location you can get ideas on the square foot gardening forum for edible plants. Here is a link that might be useful: Making the Most of Shade: How to Plan, Plant, and Grow a Fabulous Garden that Lightens up the Shadows

I've done "xeric" conversions by killing the existing grass with Roundup, then mulching. The "lasagna" style or just a couple of layers of landscape fabric works well. It's not 100% weed-free. Dig right through the sod to plant - whap the clods to get the roots out of the dirt and fill the holes up with native dirt. The trick is to water the grass really well for a week or so to get it growing fast, then spray thoroughly. Mow it really short, leaving the clippings. Water well for another week or two to lure the survivors up and spray them.

Assuming that the bed was moist when planted, early irrigation for the plants will be as you are doing -- frequently and a modest amount. After the plants are established, you can move to less frequent but deep. "Deep" in any case, is the depth of the entire root system. The time to water is when you have the time. Along with that, a critical goal is to have the plants fully hydrated when they meet the day. The key to avoid leaf diseases, is to water at ground level -- that is, keep the leaves dry. If watering overhead, do so early enough in the day that the leaves dry before nightfall. Lay out the soaker and leave it in place. (Re-arranging it daily is a nightmare.) Even so, I find that hand watering each small rootball is important to help the transplants get through the 1st 10 to 14 days. Enjoy your garden!

I presume you are talking about edging the planting bed with a hardscape feature ...? Always, I find edgings that stick up above grade usually add a busy, junky quality to the overall scene. What makes this worse is that they are usually installed in an unprofessional way ... wiggling and undulating a bit, which makes them look cheap and tacky. A much better solution is a flush laid brick, stone or paver mowing strip that is 8" min. in width, installed to smoothly flow (without wiggling or undulation) with the grade. If you're talking about "edging" with plants, I absolutely would not do this. It's not necessary and is almost always (of course there are a FEW exceptions to just about every rule) a visual detraction. Many times it makes maintenance more difficult, too, as one is tasked with needing to keep an edging plant separate from the plants behind it.