Your situation sounds exactly like mine! I'm facing another summer in this house and I'm so overwhelmed with house projects that the garden just makes me want to cry! I have exsisting beds and major landscaping that was put in by the previous owner, but neglected for several years. I also don't know where anything is plantd, so I don't know what's a weed and what's a plant when it comes up. I too was told that weed cloth is a mess. I've been considering doing what you were thinking. I was going to actually use plastic or tarps to kill all the vegetation in one large area, and keep it plant free until I'm ready to deal with it. I don't see why that wouldn't work, and I'm considering doing that this spring in some areas. I've also just purchased a small, cultivator/tiller that is gas powered and I can till under the weeds in large areas and start from scratch. I was advised to give Preen, a pre-emergence a try to in areas that have exsisting plants that I don't want to kill. I'm going to try a combination of those things, but no weed cloth in the beds after I have worked the area, I hear its just a pain to deal with. I too, would like to use newspaper, but don't get a daily paper either! I'm thinking about posting an ad on craigslist asking for free newspaper, or just asking everyone I know to save their papers for me!

Why would you put on vinyl siding and then paint it? If you are set on vinyl, that defeats the purpose of no maintenance. Just throwing out my thoughts....... IF the structure is sound, it doesn't appear there is much inside worth working around so I'd make it a blank slate. In other words, I don't see interesting old casings or a cute kitchen to restore. My inclination would be to make it clean and spare, no curliques. As for the metal roof, I love them and think that would look great on a structure like that but not in blue. I also wouldn't do blue siding (or paint) but I'm not a blue house person.

I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around the porch. A roofed porch? You would have to extend your current roof line, and wouldn’t the pitch quickly make it too low? I don’t love having a deck in the front of the house. It’s too casual. Is it sitting on concrete? It looks like that in the picture, but I can’t tell for certain. If not, stairs from front door to a little patio courtyard-y thing? With some nice pots? Hard to decide about the rest until you’ve tamed the nature.

I'm guessing your backyard is perhaps 50' wide. It looks to be at least 70' deep. I recommend you make a plan using graph paper (aka quadrille paper) you can print out HERE. Measure and write down the length and width of sidewalks, circlular patio length and width from your house. Measure how far you have set the playset from the fence and from the sidewalk. Measure how far the trunks of trees and bushes you want to keep are from the corners of your yard. Then draw the outlines of these on the graph paper. You don't have to be totally accurate, but this will make your plans more acccurate. Below is what I did from viewing your photos. I think you should have as much lawn as possible, but the blue areas above are where I think you will have the greatest trouble growing grass. This is because people tend to take the shortest path between two points. I have assumed your back door lines up with the long walkway. You should put down a mulch below the playset to help keep your kids clean. However, to stop people from taking a short cut you need to put up a barrier (low hedge or other plants that can't be walked over/through) and/or add paving to where they are most likely to walk. I can see the remnants of brick paving at the edge of the patio in photo #4. You should replace/repair this walkway and fill in the corner with low growing shrubs or perennials. Since it can take several years for plants to fill in use annuals to fill any bare spots. As to screening the playspace...most parents want to see their kids in case something goes wrong. When planting fruit trees (or any other tree or shrub) pay attention to the expected mature spread. If a mature tree is expected to be 15' wide it should be planted 8' from a fence, walkway, building, etc. A group of fruit trees should allow enough space between trees for optimum health, so two trees each expected to be 15' wide when mature should be planted 15' apart.