Thanks so much for all your helpful responses! I knew it was a good choice to ask here. This espaliering idea sounds very enticing =] I've never heard of it, I'll be sure to read up about it. I really like persimmons and would love to have one, but thought there was no way I would have room for one. Is any particular type of rootstock required for it (semi-dwarf or dwarf), or is a regular tree fine for the purpose? I am attaching an aerial view of my house, right side is North (amazing what the internet gives you these days): 1. Location of presumed apricot tree. 2. Now I am thinking of planting the Red Baron peach in this location to give it some breathing room. I think it would look more aesthetic a little removed from the apricot. What are your ideas? About 6 feet to the right is a flower bed directly next to the wall and I was thinking of also planting a Washington Navel semi-dwarf or dwarf there. But maybe that would be a good location for the espaliered persimmon instead. 3. I was thinking of planting a kumquat in this patch, do you think it would be a good idea? Backyardener, in those pictures the backyard indeed looks dim and wet, but during the day the side depicted gets a lot of sun and is quite bright, and then lawn had just been watered hence the wetness. I'm hoping I'll be able to pull of some of these trees (fingers crossed). Do you think it's possible to prune that old unruly grapevine all the way down to the trunk and re-train it? I'll take your advice and probably use a 4-arm Kniffin training. mudflapper, thanks for the blueberry tips. I'm a little discouraged that they won't have optimal conditions since they seem to be picky plants, but after paying $40 for both of them I'm damn well gonna try getting them to grow. glenn_russel, some really great ideas, I was thinking about raised beds too. I'll have to see just how and where I could implement them. ashleysf, wooooow that is impressive. 25 types of fruit! Thanks for the link, some really interesting ideas on that website with planting four trees in the same area and keeping them trimmed to a manageable size. tagtail, thanks a lot for the fruit tree list! I like the Fuyu persimmon choice, always ended up eating the Hachiya ones early and getting that nasty astringent throat. I'm impressed you were able to tell I have a fig tree in the background. When we first got the house I actually thought it was a guava for a while until I googled some pictures =) So you would pick espaliered fruit trees over grapes? I'm definitely excited about the idea and would like to try it on at least one tree, but I also don't really want to throw all five of my grapes away. Maybe I'll mix and match. How young of a tree should I get for espaliering? I'm guessing rootstock is preferable? Up till now I have been buying potted containers.

Italian cypress

I think this is going to turn out to be a learning experience for you over the next few years when you see how huge that grass is going to become. In spite of people saying you must move it away from the fence, it is much too close to it and the bed it's in is much too small. One plant should not be closer than 3' to 3 1/2' to the fence. Also, there is no point in placing two like that. Isn't there another corner of the back yard where you could use it to balance out the overall scene? ...Or somewhere else? If you look how big and fat the plant is in my illustration, which I'm not exaggerating, you'll see that the current placement is not going to work out. If you want to add color in front of the grass, increase the bed size large enough to accommodate more plants. You could expand the bed either to right or left along the fence. Or you could make a quarter circle bed that goes from side fence to back fence, and encircle the entire front of the grass with a lower perennial. Hybrid daylilies might work out well as they take full sun, are easy, and can be very long blooming. Or, you could do annuals.

"The large deck ... is structurally sound, the boards are not in good shape." What exactly does "not in good shape" mean? ... that the surface is not good but otherwise they are OK ...? That sounds like a couple of decks that came with a house I once owned. They were functional but ugly from years of weathering and no attention whatsoever. They were transformed into completely acceptable, nice actually, merely with pressure washing, a quick, coarse sanding, and two or three coats of deck paint (not stain) applied with a paint roller. It was not a huge, horrible job and they looked almost as good as new. They were much easier to keep clean with a hard paint surface. The cost to fix it this way, if DIY, would be a couple hundred bucks. If not DIY, a few hundred ... vs. $17K. If you could get another dozen years our of your deck and have it look nice, too, would that be acceptable? Landscaping is a discipline where one must not ignore site conditions or impose unrealistic solutions if they expect to produce a result that is pleasant, lasting and maintainable. I question the overall direction of making a small porch with steps down to where all the landscape features would be. This seems intrinsically less useful than would be having a decent sized deck immediately off of the main living space. I see a grill but not a dining table. Where does the outdoor dining happen? If the kitchen is separated from outdoor dining by a full flight of steps, it will surely be made much more inconvenient. But the real deal-breaker for me is the imposition of "no groundcover," which is driven by unrealistic beliefs based on emotion, when the site itself is demanding groundcover for practical reasons: there is slope and there is shade. Are we really going to spend $50K in order to change this into flat, sunny ground? It's going to require significant retaining walls & grading in addition to all the other new hardscape and planting. On the subject of husband's allergies to pine, I presume you're talking about allergies to pine pollen (since contact with the plant itself can be easily avoided)? Getting rid of the pines is going to make virtually no difference if there are other pines in the neighborhood or region. During the pollen season, which lasts for a couple of weeks, it can blow statewide and there's no escaping it. One's best hope of avoiding it is to stay indoors as much as possible during that time. I think you should begin with the budget because it will determine what is possible vs. what is fantasy. Re-contemplate the goals ... not how to achieve them, but simply the objectives themselves ... what activities do we want to do outside? How convenient do we want them to be? How private should it be? ... etc.