When it comes to deciding which Austin's to add to a no/very little spray garden I highly suggest most any Austin rose introduced from Jude the Obscure to the present. While not EVERY Austin from JtO on is perfectly healthy the odds are very high that you can get by without major disease prevention work. Older Austins will be a flip of the coin, some are fairly healthy and some are dead roses growing unless sprayed twice monthly. I do NOT spray any of my roses at all. If a rose needs life support from anti fungal sprays just to live it won't be in my garden. Hybrid perpetuals and bourbons are both a toss up as far as being healthy in the damp NW climate. As much as possible it is best to plant them in such a way that the wind does not blow BS spores from one bush to the next or you end up with sickly sticks. Our house is directly across Puget Sound from Seattle and from the upper garden area I can be working in the plants and listen to the waves hitting the beach below and sniffing the scents wafting up from the fragrant roses and other flowers closer to the house. And one thing about once blooming roses which you noted that you do not like. Up here we do not get that blast furnace heat during the late spring/early summer that fries the roses farther south. Up here we get five to seven weeks of continuous bloom for our ONCE bloom.

I went with 3 crepe myrtles from a local nursery. They fit the bill as far as lower branching (check), nice glossy foliage (check), good fall color and nice bark. They were also relatively inexpensive. The $64,000 question is will they bloom in this spot, with intermittent morning and afternoon sun. I think I'll be OK either way, although of course I'd prefer them to bloom. I looked hard to dwarf or Asian forms of Mountain Ash but couldn't find any (I went to 3 pretty big nurseries south of Seattle) that met the bill (I really wanted to stay under 2o feet of height and the most common European and American mountain ashes get larger than this). Ironically, it is evident that my crepe myrtles are somewhat water sensitive (I suspect they are potted in a potting mixture that is too dry). In the mid-Atlantic (where I used to live), they were legendary for their drought & heat tolerance. The ones I have, I suspect if they went 8 or 9 days without water, they'd be dead. They'll be planted soon. Goofy

Hi Ahelaumakani, If you put a raised bed directly up against your fence, then yes, you would have to worry about rotting it out. You would have to make a bit of room between the fence and whatever you used for the edging of your raised bed to prevent rot. St. Augustine will grow in the shade. Bermuda won't grow in very shady areas (Bermuda can be a gardener's nightmare because it's very invasive. I have it.) I'm not crazy about either of these grasses because they take a lot of water to keep them green; however, these are the two most used grasses in Austin. Others are Zoysia, Buffalo grass (native) and Turfalo. Winter Rye is also sometimes over-seeded into other grasses in the fall. It grows all winter, but then you have to mow in the winter or so I've been told. :-( As edging for a raised bed: cut dry-stacked limestone would be pretty, but might be too expensive. Wood boards work, but will eventually rot. Cinder blocks and bricks would also work. Lowe's and Home Depot also have various concrete pavers & scalloped edgers that might work as well. Or- instead of doing a raised bed, add lots of compost to amend your existing soil or create a lasagna bed as suggested above. Containers also work well as act-upon suggested above. Containers can be arranged and moved around in a variety of configurations, which is a plus, and you can stand one pot behind another and make it taller by putting it on a brick or cinderblock or place several pots on a wooden shelf or two supported by cinderblocks or pavers, if need be. With our heat, I would suggest you use the largest containers possible because they will dry out quickly. Clay pots generally dry out more quickly than plastic but in my opinion, clay pots are prettier. I have plants in clay pots, wash tubs, plastic pots, and one copper pot. Even ugly black nursery pots can be painted with spray paint or house paint in fun colors to make them pretty. I actually put mulch over the soil in some of my container plants. You can intersperse different kinds of containers/pots in a garden bed and that can look good too. You might also purchase or make a trellis for a vine and you can hang a plant wall-pocket or two on your fence to jazz it up. As for Hostas, I haven't seen many grown in Austin, but that doesn't mean it's not possible. Treelover is right that raised beds do dry out more quickly.

"As a gardener I am worried that I will just plant things and not have them create the finished look I'm hoping for." This is exactly what will happen if work proceeds without a comprehensive plan! The drawing is a good start for something to add measurements to in order that you can plot it out accurately on graph paper. As Gardengal mentioned, it needs to be to scale, so someone preparing to figure out what will fit ... will know if it will fit. One can also see all the bed shapes at a glance and know that they are compatible with one another and use good geometry for their lines. There is a tendency for drawings drawn by those who don't do it regularly to become very cluttered and hard to read, so I'd suggest you leave out everything extraneous and draw only the necessary: buildings, fences, curbs, landscape walls, walks, drive, tree trunks, AC, etc. Label plants at the edge of the drawing and use a thin line to connect it's name to the plant. The initial plan is a base plan. It shows only permanent existing features. Proposed features will come later on a copy. I was trying to reconcile one of your photos (left side of house) with the plan. The curb should be drawn in so we can see where the yard ends and know that there's a street over there. I see a birch tree in the pic but not on the plan. Is it being removed? The triangular raised bed does not look good. If you plan to get rid of it, don't show it on the plan. If you don't plan to get rid of it ... why? Dimensional lumber raised beds are typically for back yard and growing vegetables. For front yard and landscaping why would you want one? Not using one will generally look and work better. If you're going to create a high dollar raised bed out of brick or stone it would be different. Otherwise, I'd leave it out. The plan calls out roses, peonies, irises, etc. but is not showing any on the plan. Do these things exist, or are they simply desired? If the former, their beds should be shown. If the latter, they should not be shown or labeled on the base plan. Draw the fence and call it out only as "fence" without using any additional arrows. If the picket fence will be in a different location, leave the fence out for now. The stepping stones seems like their path would be subject to changing in a new plan. I would leave them out for now. If there was foundation planting at the house and any planting along fence (which looks like their direction you're leaning) then the stepping stone path would probably only fit somewhere near the center line of the space between house and garage. It's a fairly skinny area and plants take up room. Right now the path is headed square into a patch of grapevines so that doesn't seem like a good walking experience. For the time being, I wouldn't think of plants. Just think of the hardscape portions of the project: walks, fences, drive, beds, etc.