Pretty house. Your choices all sound good, except the Alberta Spruce...a real dyer. Too hot for it here. I get most ideas from magazines or books...just see a picture and fall in love. I think "what do I want?", now "how can I ammend that so I can actually do it and afford it.?" Most of all, have fun.

Thanks for the advice on the alberta spruce. do you have any suggestions on what I would use on the corners in place of it. I have been scouring every book and magazine I can find and I think I have come up with a design. I am still unsure about what to do on the front (faces north). I am thinking about using loropetalum am not sure because of the size they can grow to be.

Thanks again.

how about some old fashioned rose bushes? Not the tea rose type but the old fashioned ones?

There are two books that I use together religiously for choosing plants. The first is "The Southern Gardener's Book of Lists" by Lois Trigg Chaplin and "The Southern Living Garden Book". I have found that using these two together keep me from making really bad choices and give me new ideas that I might not have had. I have also saved magazine articles from gardening magazines with pictures that have aspects that I like. Also, I would recommend that you get some graft paper, measure and draw out the areas that you want to plant. This really helps with figuring out the full grown size of the little plants that you will buy and how many you will need. You can fill in with perennials and annuals until the shrubs grow up. I think that the biggest mistake that folks make in their foundation planting is putting in shrubs that get too big for the area. Good luck and happy planting.

Thanks so much. That is exactly why I am redoing my landscape. I put too many and too close to my house and they do not look good so close and smothered out my nandinas. Thanks for the advice.

Stefanie, I'm late to this thread, but just joined the forum recently. I was actually searching this forum for "dwarf evergreen" when your post came up. If you haven't decided on things already, I would suggest sky pencil holly for the corners. Our landscaper put these in at the front corners & near the front entry of our house 5 years ago; they only get about 8-10 ft tall and are about 1-2 ft wide. Leaves are much like a boxwood or yaupon. They don't shade other plantings but provide some height without blocking any views. We have been very happy with them. I also have some Indian Hawthorne in another bed near the back of the house which have done well. But I planted some in a bed out away from the house and must warn you that deer munched the leaves this year. They have come back, but if you are in a deer-prone area, you might consider what the deer will do. We don't usually have them very close to the house, but this past winter they must have run out of food in the woods.

i think you can grow dwarf alberta spruce with some afternoon shade.
here is mine (left-center in front of the pale, pink azalea)in its 5th year, around 3' tall, sun until 1:00 p.m.
it may never be as dense as if it were growing in a more suitable climate, but it is doing o.k. for me. for how long? i don't know but it's fun to experiment.
i love conifers, myself, and am especially fond of the blues and golds.
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there are other choices for you for dwarf conifers. some of the chamaecyparis, cryptomerias or juniperus species would work.