Karin, it's interesting and enlightening to read what others think of our house and landscape, even if we may not agree or take up some suggestions. We live in an area where we don't have a large number of options for landscape/garden design, unfortunately! So no worries about me being offended by criticism/suggestions, etc. We appreciate the help and we will work to think about each decision in terms of its purpose. We originally had purposes in mind for each bed in our backyard, though it may not look like it now - with the exception of the hydrangeas along the back fence. They were originally planted behind our garage (where the pool equipment enclosure is now). When we put in the pool, we moved them to the side bed (which didn't exist before the pool) along the fence, but the neighbor's black walnut tree hampered their growth. So rather than throw them away, we made a new bed along the back, sort of a temporary spot until we figure out what to do with the rest of the beds. I won't bore you or anyone else by enumerating the purposes of the other beds in the back, but just want to add that we also did have more visual interest and contrast in flower, foliage, and form - but many of those plants didn't survive. We've been in a sort of holding pattern back there for a couple years - and I'm looking forward to improving that landscape. But back to the front yard/landscape. One of our goals for changes remains to revise the long bed along the drive for the dual purposes of easier maintenance and including more variety in its plants to provide more interest in months other than July. Another goal is to revise the small bed near the side steps to make it better looking (instead of a hodgepodge of plants, as it is now) and as a memorial garden for our daughter, with beautiful plantings. We also still want to improve the visual impact/visibility of the front door. To me, that is a separate goal from emphasizing the front entrance, if by entrance one means the wide front steps (which aren't truly the entrance to the house, but visually they do give that impression). We understand the goals of Laag's ideas about beds in front of the steps and a wide path from the driveway to the steps/porch. But in terms of practicality, we don't want people to stop midway up our driveway and walk up the path, because then they block the entire driveway. Also, the steps are covered with snow for the entire winter (it's too expensive to pay to have them cleared each time it snows), and a walkway would also be covered in snow, so the practical function of a walkway beginning partway up the driveway wouldn't apply during those months. I've been bothered for a while by the sense of imbalance between the long driveway bed and the expanse of grass on the other side of the drive, so another purpose of making changes is to see if we can balance that. Laag's suggestion about a grassed area in the long bed was so helpful - I just don't know whether that is enough to achieve balance, or if we will need a bed under the birches. A new purpose resulted from a number of comments here, and that is to soften the impact of the veranda wall. I think we are just so used to how our house looks that we don't see it for how it really appears. You all have opened our eyes to this issue! I haven't been in the back yards of the houses above us (in the back) to see what they can see of our back yard. It "feels" private in our back yard most of the time, probably due to the fence, but I still don't do any skinny-dipping. ;-) The front feels very public to me (it's a busy street and in the spring/summer/fall, a very busy golf course), with the exception of the veranda. On the rare occasions when we are seated there (it's usually too hot/buggy/raining/cold), we have at least the illusion of privacy behind that fortress wall - though with close neighbors, we have to watch how loudly we talk. My sister mused aloud a few years ago about the idea of putting a hedge across the front of the yard (on the lawn on the house side of the sidewalk, if you're facing away from the house) to screen the street and provide more of a sense of privacy. A neighbor a couple of houses down has a partial bridal wreath hedge in the yard and she was noting that at the time. I'll update as we get further along in this process; meanwhile, if anyone has more comments/suggestions, we're very happy to have them.

Azan, no offense to others expressing their opinions, this is where you really do need the service of a competent designer, who truly understands what constitutes good design which you will NOT get from the contractor who's giving you a quote that covers design, materials & labor, or friends, family or neighbors. Speaking of which, do you live in an HOA? If you do, get a copy of the design standards or architectural guidelines and find out what you have to do to get your proposed alteration through the review committee. You may well be stuck. You currently have a modern builder's silly notion of what constitutes a "colonial". I am so sorry to say, again no offense to others who think it's a beautiful colonial house, it isn't. And there are probably another 20 down the street from you, with minor variations, all designs that would have given colonial era master builders (where design and construction are combined) a convulsion. There are all kinds of things wrong with the facade composition, like 3 different window proportions and shapes, which no amount of landscaping will solve and you are absolutely right that the porch is a problem, but it's not about brick vs stone. Changing a consistent material on a house is the last thing you should do to "improve" the look. When I was in graduate school, a one-off course was offered on "facade composition" one summer. Finally, a professor teaching us aspiring architects how to design a facade, rather than all that nonsense about "form-making"! I stayed just to benefit from his wisdom. Guess what, there were 30 plus grad students taking this course, and the historic preservation expert told us, we will team up in pairs, analyze historic facades, and we'll talk about it. Really, that's the class? Yes indeed, it's called a graduate seminar. Imagine that happening in med or law school! (Hey, I may be the professor but I am not a practitioner, why don't we just get together and learn from one another?) He didn't teach us the principles and theories of facade composition, though here and there he offered some useful observations. Undergrad & grad arch'l school, not one professor taught us anything about facade composition. Not one. Imagine! So I went to the library, dug up old architectural magazines, from the early 1900s, and taught myself, by analyzing facade compositions I admire. You can do the same. Get a couple books on historic colonial architecture, or better yet on your next getaway, go visit historic places filled with colonial architecture, like Colonial Williamburg, Annapolis or Alexadria (if you live in VA). Not everyone can design well or cook well, but everyone can learn to appreciate good design or good cooking.

There are a couple of issues that I don't see being addressed: 1) It's possible that the ends of the valance are also glued in place. If so, removing glue residue and trying to restain the areas to match will be much harder than suggested. 2) The areas on the cabinets on each side that are now covered by the ends of the valance may be a different shade after years of not being exposed to sunlight. If so, staining these areas to match the rest of the cabinet may also be hard. I'm not trying to discourage you, but simply trying to prepare you for the issue that stain matching may be more of a challenge than making the holes disappear. Instead of spot-staining, it might be easier and better looking in the long run to mount a simple, low profile 3/4" trim strip covering the area that will be newly exposed and running it from top to bottom on the two flanking cabinets (so it will look like an intentional design element). It will be easier to blend the finish of this trim with the rest of the cabinet than to deal with trying to make the isolated, exposed areas match the old finish.

#3. All brick with siding under porch. Get rid of faux stone accents on corners at foundation. Do not pay extra for those. They are awful. If you have to have stone, only do it along the base of the foundation. Paint the garage doors as close to the color of the brick that you select to remove emphasis of huge garage doors. There is no hiding them, but you don't want them to be the focal point. Why #3? It has the most simple elevation and avoids most of the McMansion from Hell elements. That's why. If it were me, I'd do all brick. Then, I'd paint the brick and garage door the same color.