It's difficult to find shrubs that happen to grow exactly to the right size and stay there. It's more likely that you can find some that stay close to the right size and only need minor trimming. But as Laceyvail notes, it would be impossible for anyone to give recommendations without seeing the setting, as "small" is relative.

Kind of guessing a bit on some of this but information is scarce. I believe out those 3 rose White Meidiland would be the healthiest and overall best of the three. That said I did have W M and it is a big rose not tall but wide. It also tip roots where ever the canes touched the soil. Mine would easily form a 12 foot diameter circle. I just did not have that kind of room. It would be great for a hillside. So that one is robust and easy to grow. I would stay away from Wedding Dress as the rose just came out and they seem to be getting rid of it already. I would also be leery of Blossom Blanket. Only because it has been around a long time and is recycled occasionally by places like Jackson and Perkins and Wayside Gardens. It sounds okay on Help Me Find but I just have a feeling that it would be a problem rose outside of dry environments. Perhaps someone else has grown this one. So a lot depends on what you need the rose to do. I have tried many ground cover roses. For a white ground cover the best I have found is a Kordes rose Innocencia. It's very healthy and a much smaller size which works for me. There is also a newer drift rose in white that looks good. Not really sure if it is a new and improved white or the old one that they used to sell. I do grow 2 Cape diamond roses. They are own root and have massive root systems. I do think that she would do well in poor soil as long as it's not too wet. She is a large shrub so give her room.

Eileen, three years ago (up north) my favorites were--large tree, red maple; small tree, Japanese maple or panicle hydrangea; shrub, Diablo ninebark, black lace elder or bridal wreath spirea; ground cover? wild ginger; perennials, too numerous to mention--Asiatic lilies, Husker red penstemon, trandescantia, Shasta daisies bee balm, rose campion (a biennial), hostas, rudbeckia, and so on and on. Hostas!!! Now, large tree, oak; small tree, Japanese maples (not that I've had one--they're SO expensive), crepe myrtles; shrubs, crepe myrtles, snowball hydrangeas, mock orange; perennials, I make no distinction between perennials and self-seeding annuals now; not interested in ground covers now. I had many favorites up north that would not do down here at all. But have discovered many new favorites--unfortunately have not yet zeroed in the sure things for my yard--so much depends on microclimates, soil, shade/sun. Dawn and many others have had several years, as have others, to discover that. I haven't yet, and so will keep experimenting. I know what isn't working in my yard after 3 summers of gardening: crazy though it seems, I have about had it with morning glories--bugs (aphids) eat the heck out of the leaves; zinnias, rudbeckia, and bee balm get bad cases of powdery mildew; phlox, that was a non-starter--began with a couple lovely pots; mildew attacked instantly. I'm a bit paranoid about crepe myrtles now, with the crepe myrtle disease circling the state (a virus, right, guys? ditto with rose bushes.) By far and away my favorites now are my four o'clocks, datura and brugmansia (thank you, Dawn), and nicotiana--more for their fragrances than their actual flowers, though all have great flowers. Brugs most likely are not hardy in your area, though on the FB OK gardening network, many folks in 7 have said theirs come back well each year (with proper placing in microclimates and mulching.) I'm hoping for that, but even if it doesn't come back, I'll have cuttings to begin new ones next spring. They can grow from 20 inches to 6 feet in one summer. I still love tradescantia, and it does well here in partial shade or mostly sun. The ones I've mentioned are not picky about the soil, or sun/shade, and most, drought. I babied the brug and kept grass clippings piled around it in the well amended soil and provided plenty of water. One I love but haven't planted yet--but will as soon as I get my sunny rock garden going is autumn sedum. Can hardly wait, I'm going to plant it everywhere there. Another one I can't kill here is yucca. They get enormous (they'd take the place of "shrub") and produce a single amazing stalk of beautiful white flowers. Hyacinth beans did an awesome job for me this year, and I'll be growing mostly them instead of morning glories now. There are just so VERY many to choose from down here, Eileen, that you would do well to focus on what is lovely to you, and then to decide if it might do well in your yard, based on your soil, your zone (cold AND heat); the amount of sun vs shade you have, if there are lots of deer or rabbits in your neighborhood--then go for it. You will have some failures, and you'll have some successes. One of my big surprise successes was endless summer hydrangeas. I'd never grown them well up north, but would get some blooms each early summer. I lucked out and put a row of them in the PERFECT place here, apparently. Although they did turn pink instead of the exquisite blue (alkaline rather than acid), they are monstrously big, and for the first time ever, have actually bloomed all summer since May. I am astonished. It has been a big big big learning curve for me, and doubtless it will continue to be until I die or cannot garden anymore. But so fun and worthwhile. Hey Dawn, I don't know if you remember, but where I lived in Wyoming, I mentioned that we could have made pottery! Actually, had I stayed in that location forever, I'm sure I would have tried it. A funny aside. I have adored climbing hydrangeas. . . has been a longtime dream to have one. So got one my first summer here, put it strategically against a large oak nearby that I wrongly assumed got a lot of dappled shade--nope--gets full hot sun from about 3-6 pm. Poor thing's oak-climbing tendrils shriveled up and died. Second summer, I planted a nandina in front--fast-growing, thought it might shade the hydrangea--but it didn't grow tall enough fast enough and tendrils again died. Imagine my laughter this year, discovering that I had many new growing vines/tendrils growing on the NORTH side of the tree. Deader than a doornail on the west, but new ones growing happily on the north side of the tree! We may have lift-off with blooms yet if I live long enough! LOL It's all a crapshoot--but the more we study and learn, the more the odds will be with us--right?

In the category of evergreen perennials, look at some of the evergreen Geraniums such Biokovo or Karmina or Veronica Georgia Blue, or some of the evergreen sedges. I have found that Gaultheria procumbens is lovely as part of a groundcover community in at least part shade, but it doesn’t grow densely enough to be a weed suppressing ground cover on its own and it may burn in full sun in your area. I also wouldn’t recommend Vinca which is overly enthusiastic, rooting into the lawn and overrunning areas where I don’t want it.