Glad you enjoyed the link. Yes, it will definitely need to be scaled down, but the pictures give you a sense of what types of plantings you'll need. To widen your sidewalk... Imagine you are standing in the driveway looking at the sidewalk. Now, step 4 feet to the right and mark a point. From that point at the edge of the drive, connect it to the corner of the sidewalk (patio). It should make a triangle. Now, just make a little curve to the line, either in or out, whatever you like, pave it in the same stone as your other area, and now you have an "entry court" instead of just a sidewalk. I'm imagining the entire paved area as one big space. You could even move some of the shrubs from in front of the windows to enclose your little courtyard, or an outline of lavender would look really great too. Then you could plant some creeping fig on the garage wall behind the bench and put up a little wall fountain which will eventually be surrounded by the plants. Or put 3-5 big pots with Italian cypress or other tall narrow shrub along the wall. Certainly save the crepe myrtle, It would look fine on the L of the drive. The other thing to think of is what you are going to be using your front yard for, if anything? Do you need the grass for play, do you want a strolling garden? You mentioned a nice entry and some privacy, is the side road busy? Do you need a big hedge on that side, or just something to add interest and make the house seem less exposed? ANother thought- put an oversized lantern on either side of your garage (mediterranean style, of course!)

Hi! I like your pink plant pots. If you like the white paint on the outside, consider a bold color door, black shutters and add big black trimmed flower boxes under the windows, with flowering shrubs and perennials in front of your porch. I love the idea of white hydrangeas fronting the concrete porch. Do you like romantic or modern & edgy? You have some nice trees, keep them trimmed up so they don't block the view of the house and windows. Try some "Aubrieta Rock Cress Cascade Purple Ground Cover Plant or Dichondra Silver Falls Ground Cover " with spiky grasses in between along the edge of the rock wall. Tuck some Creeping Jenny in between for variety in color. Whatever you plant, try to keep it low maintenance and slow growing as that is a real selling point for the future.

As mentioned, by nature of the architecture, there are few places to put plants against the house at this front face. The overhang plus the lower windows does not invite foundation planting at that area. A large planter could go in front of the wall just right of the large window set. A shrub at left of the left house corner could help establish a better setting so one's view doesn't run directly off the house to what's across the street. (Maybe there are some plantings at the left side of house that can help with this, too.) Other than that, some large, circular beds around the two major trees could help give some fullness to the overall look and a sense of the patio space being more protected from the public space. The height of that groundcover could be as much as 3'+ to as little as 8", with the taller giving a more protected look. There is some opportunity for colorful seasonal blooming depending on what plants you use. My suggestions are for layout and arrangement. Plants have to be chosen from what works well in your locale. I got rid of the tall evergreen left of the door. It seems overwhelming to the porch/entrance space, IMO. To clean up the overall picture more, I'd get rid of large-tree foliage that hangs low enough to shroud the roof. This might mean hanging limbs/branches, or removing some lower branches entirely. (It is apparent at the tree at the left that some branches should have been removed way back when the tree was young ... before these turned into a major part of the trunk system and are not hard to remove without removing a lot of canopy with them.) The grass looks pretty healthy in spite of the shade. It's hard to tell if there is enough hill to warrant complaints by the grass-cutter. If it's tolerable, I'd leave as grass. Later though, since there are more trees on the way, shade could become too much and warrant conversion of those areas to groundcover. I like the house colors and think they are well suited so wouldn't change anything there.

Dennis - Unless I missed it, you didn't say what direction the front of your house faces, and how much sun it got, that is, if it's sun is obstruction by tall buildings on the other side of the street. The other very, very important thing for you to think about, of which other Houzzers might not be aware is that Southern California goes through extreme water shortages pretty much every single year, and many areas are told to not water their lawn or do it only minimally for parts of the year. That should really inform how you think about landscaping. Admittedly, I do understand if you despise cacti and other succulents. But you might want to seriously think about eschewing live grass in favor of artificial turf. There are marvelous artificial turfs now that would fool anyone, certainly from standing height, and you obviously don't need to water it and think of all the $$ you save in gardener's fees, and none of those those pesky varmints rolling up the sod, either.! You can can still have specifically carved out flower beds, and trees and bushes with planned irrigation for those specific areas. Your area abounds with very experienced landscape architects. You want someone who has an artistic eye, and who knows hardscape and who is very familiar with the plants that do well in your area, and is familiar with the exigencies of life in SoCal and in your microclimate and can speak frankly with you about what you want to get out of your garden and how much work you are willing to put in to it. Do you sit outdoors in the front or the back? Do you want fragrant flowers on a trellis where you sit there or will a fragrance annoy the heck out of you? Will you sit outside in the morning or night, so do you need flowers that bloom in the am or bloom in the evening with colors that will be seen sell in twilight and at night? Do you want an herb garden for cooking? Do you want vegetables? Do you want several rose bushes so you can fill your house with roses, or other flowers so you can always have bouquets? Of course Dig Doug's designs look fantabulous as always, but note that his designs show significant hardscape changes to the front of the house. You might want to think about saving up some money for the hardscape work. If you get rid of the grass and put in artificial turf, you will end up saving a fortune of money on your water bill that you can put toward hardscape. If you have never owned a house before, you would not believe how much the water bill will be, and when you add in watering the lawn, holy moly!