I am assuming that you are having any "hard-scaping" put in - paths, walls/terracing, benches, fences, pergolas, arbors, rocks, etc., as well as running water lines and electrical lines as planned - before you do anything much about making beds or improving the soil? Since these will all require earth-moving, to whatever degree, it's MUCH better to do them before trying to make beds and plant things, only to have to move them for workmen, or to re-improve the soil that is now compacted from machinery, tramping on, etc.! As shown above, a good "background" of hard-scape will look good in the winter with all the leaves off, and not be really be noticeable in the summer, except in little vignettes, like the picket fence at the top, or the rocks at the bottom of the slope. I would (cliche warning) strive for a mix of evergreen and deciduous shrubs, the former including a mix of both conifers and broad-leafed evergreens. The more dwarf conifers will stay in proportion for longer, but if you plant the larger ones anyway, leave enough room for them to get full size, planting around them with perennials or with shrubs you don't mind losing as the "star" grows to fill its allotted space. It is SO easy to succumb to the easily done feeling that things out of 1 or 2-gallon nursery pots won't REALLY get THAT big - "only see how small it is now, I can easily put 2 more plants next to it, there's plenty of room", only to find 3-6 years down the road that they are all growing badly, overshadowed by their neighbors and looking awful! For flowering shrubs, full sun, try lilacs, spireas, forsythia, the Knock-out roses (I prefer the reds, single or double, but..., the pinks are nice too), other shrub roses, Clethra, various dogwoods, Hydrangeas, mountain laurels, viburnums, etc.. Blueberries are another possibility, flowers, fruit, if you get to them before the birds, and fall foliage (and if you have a bad deer problem, never mind...). Taller sun specimens can include service berry, red bud, smoke bush, crab apples, mock orange/Philadelphus, ink berry. Shade includes the azaleas, rhodies, calycanthus (pick one noted for scent), witch hazels, etc. For evergreens, there are almost too many conifers to choose from, but a short, quick selection would have to include dwarf Alberta spruce, if hardy, any of the smaller Hinoki cypress, smaller cedars, yew, junipers, etc. Broadleaf evergreens - hollies, rhodies, kerria, some viburnums, boxwoods, etc. Don't forget the ornamental grasses and carex, sizes ranging from a few inches to more than 8'.

---""Personally, I dont think it is smart financial planning to have your entire life savings in your retirement account." Why not?"" I'd like to clarify the above response. The only exception that I can think of is an emergency account.--- Assuming you are funding your retirement account appropriately to provide adequate retirement income, why would you put additional savings into retirement accounts? Once there, you can't use them easily and without penalty until you are retirement age. No, tax savings from tax-deferred accounts are not inconsequential, but neither is the freedom that comes with having money available to use how when for what you want. I am putting money into a combination of 401k and Roth retirement accounts at a rate which will conservatively provide me with adequate retirement income. This is less than the max--(although well over employer-match). Every thing else goes into ordinary ol' non-tax-deferred investment accounts. It's not really "emergency" money--- i also have 6-month living expense emergency funds in my bank account. But I am in my 30s. Why would I put any money above and beyond what I will need for retirement somewhere that I can't easily reach it for the next 15-20 years? Maybe I'll want to go to grad school and want to use it for tuition. Maybe I'll get married and want to put my husband through school. Or my husband's kids. Maybe I'll want to buy a bigger more expensive house and want to use it for down payment. Or a second vacation and/or investment home. I might want to take a year off work and travel. I might want to take a year off work and be a mommy to a new baby. I might not *want* to take a year off work but be forced to when I'm fired from my current job and it takes me a year to find a new one. I might want start-up money for my own business. I might have a sudden desire for one of those convertible Mercedes two-seaters (is it the SL i think).... I might I might I might. Freedom (and security) is "why not?" (which are the same reasons btw that I'm saving it in the first place rather than simply spending everything above and beyond what I've decided I need to save for retirement)

You'll probably have multiple employers over time. Set up an IRA at a good low cost broker - Vanguard, T. Rowe Price, Fidelity - and when you leave a job, roll your 401(k) monies into your IRA. Consolidation will make not only your paperwork easier to create a proper allocation mix (and annual re-allocation), it will also be a great relief to your heirs. Yes, I know you're young and healthy, but believe me, it is a LOT easier to keep the beneficiary designations updated on ONE consolidated IRA account, rather than the half-dozen assorted 401(k)s you've created after a while! Right now my nephew/niece and I are beating up on their dad (figuratively, of course!) because he has 401k funds at possibly 7 or 8 companies. I think my sister, his ex-wife, is still listed as beneficiary on most of them. Since she's got a million bucks in the bank and is semi-retired by choice, and he'd prefer the money go to his kids, it seems rather foolish to be risking letting his paperwork go - particularly since he suffered an unexpected heart attack recently! Really, you'll find life is much simpler if you consolidate your accounts. All it usually takes, once you've set up the IRA, is a phone call and a few simple pages to fill out.

Thanks - but I guess I am confused again on several points. 1) I do have a separate account for a roth IRA created a few years ago. I was hoping to contribute the max $5k, to my Roth and the max $5K to a reg IRA (after tax), in addition to what i already contributed to my old 401K (which I will be rolling over into an IRA account.) Is there a limit on what the yearly total of the three account contributions can be? 2) Since I was previously putting about 30-35% of my income into my 401K in previous years, trying to get as close to the max as I could, i am worried about a big tax hit this year (6 months of full income with no 401K deductions to reduce it), so was looking for an option to reduce my tax bite. 3) If need to keep all my pre and post tax IRA records, it sounds like I will have a lot to do on retiring in 5-8 years, going thru all my old IRA records (hmmm, about 30 years worth of monthly statements from a variety of companies), I had thought this was true, but apparantly I got some bad advice from an accountant a few years ago, who assured me there was no reason to keep all my various accounts (pension and 401K rollovers, and post and pre tax iras) separate. Argh! such fun to look forward to - but I am pretty sure I saved most everything - got the cardboard boxes to prove it.