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!

Your house is really cute and there is a lot of potential to really make it stand out! I would definitely tear out those bushes (they are just kind of random) and put in three of the same shrub. There are so many choices out there. Just think about whether you want evergreen, flowering and consider the light conditions mainly. My first thought, and it seems a lot of others thought this too, is to get some nice planters to put on each side of the ledges. If that grass doesn't work out, then a ground cover would be low maintenance. Another idea would be to add some small evergreen shrubs to outline the perimeter of your new grassy area.

What a lovely space. I think some wall brackets with small chains and clear votive would look nice. You could place small plants in them or even candles. It would lessen the dilemma center the china cabinet on the wall or center the piano. Perhaps the piano could be placed on an angle in another corner or part of the room. Good luck.

Bergen Furniture - thank you for you advice, can you clarify? Do you mean move the mirror and lamps out of the room and use the 4 other pictures? Also, I should let folks know that I was going to make all 4 pictures white matted prints similar to the small clock tower print - I have that in 3 other styles so they coordinate). I'll move some things around and upload more pictures. Thank you!!