Wow you received lots of responses. Without reading all the posts, my first thoughts are: Remove existing walkway and make a new one that is 4 feet wide, flares at both ends and is 4 to 5' from the house. You need a deciduous med size tree on the left side of your house to soften the hard lines of the house cornor and to visually off-set where your house ends. A large tree in the back of your house will help balance the scale between the size of your home and the never ending sky, I am a big fan of plantings that are viewed from the inside of the home. I can't be sure from the photos how much room you have so my ideas might be way off. Pictures tend to make spaces seem bigger then what it really feels like when standing in the site. So forgive me if my ideas prove to be totally of base. These are just some of my design principals. I do not think you should put taller shrubs under the window, it will only create a bulky look. Try small low groundcover 12inches, evergreen, and carry the bed to the other side of the walk so you are walking between a sea of green, maybe long blooming clematis w/trellis on wall if exposure is apropriate or something like an Enkianthus which is an upright growing decideous shrub with great follage and a growth habit that can be prunned and kept natural and airy and NOT sheared into a ball or square thus making your house look more boxy. Good luck. Remember that works of art take time so rather then you budget controlling the final results, let the best design do the controlling a little at a time. Ally

Thanks for the comments and links, guys. If I get enough baby-free time that isn't spent in the garden, I'll try to post a pic. I have a 1969 straight brick ranch. It doesn't have any nice architectural features and looks exactly like most of the houses in my neighborhood that were all built together. Because it's a starter neighborhood, few people have spent any money on landscaping, so I see a lot of what doesn't work (overgrown yew foundation plantings, box trimmed junipers, no care at all, etc). The former owner of my house tried to spruce it up and added a large raised curving flower bed with rock borders in front of the house and filled it with too-closely planted lilac shrubs and some vinca. The curving lines, large rocks and raised flower bed actually help the house's look, making it one of the nicer fronts in the neighborhood. The hell strip originally had a tree circle lined in rock border to match the house, with various bulbs and lilies inside. The rest of the strip was grass. We removed all but 5 of the largest rocks when we replaced the scrubby city oak with a prettier kwanzaa cherry. My hubby's answer about best mowing line would be 'straight' or no mowing at all!! Second best would be the widest angle possible since the strip is so narrow. I have been trying to think of something that would have straighter lines but give the illusion of curves. Thanks for all the responses.

Crape Murder a.k.a. "whack(ing) the cr*p outta them every spring to keep them in check" or "the Crape Myrtle version of tree toping", destroys the form and beauty of Crape Myrtles. There are currently over 130 posts on Gardenweb advising against this particular practice. My mom did this to her Crape Myrtles last year. They had always looked so pretty, but were getting larger than she liked. I was over there the other day and noticed how horrible they looked. She is heart broken over the results. I wished she had asked me before she did it. Also, why do all the work of having to prune every year. Even if you are really good at pruning and do it correctly (heading back technique), it's just not worth all the trouble. It's much easier to get the right plant for the spot to start with.

Wow, I'm amazed by all the helpful ideas and comments! It took me a while today just to process everything - thank you, everyone, so much! I went to the local nursery today and bought some morning glory seeds to run up the front posts. Roobear - I LOVE the drawing you did!! And I love the look of those front posts; they are definitely going on the "wish" list if we can fit them in the budget, maybe for next summer. For now, we're going with some vines. Thank you so much for taking the time to do that picture; it really made me see the possibilities! Did I mention I LOVE it?! I'll either do a trellis around the meter box, or possibly get a nice tree to plant on the other side of the walk to hide it from the street, as rosie suggested. We dug down around the concrete walk tonight, and it goes down several inches...too far to break up with just a sledgehammer - we tried. So, instead of going through the expense and hassle of moving the walk, I think we'll just have to leave it. I'm also going to get a tree of some kind to place on the opposite side of the house (left side when facing from the street), and expand the front garden out and circle around it. Hopefully that will give some dimension to the front. I also love the red door in roobear's pic. I would not have chosen red if I hadn't seen that visual; it's nice how it makes the door a focal point. Thank you all again - in two days you gave me more ideas here than I've come up with in a year. I'll try to post some pics once we put things together!