Welcome Risa and congrats on your new home. Hang around here long enough and you'll learn lots.
First pick up a Western Garden Book available at bookstores, online, Lowes, HD, nurseries etc.
There are plenty of plants that flower in the winter.
Can you tell us more about the area as in how much sun, water, colors you prefer, height restrictions etc.

Second season to me is the 2nd year they are in the ground.
But here in socal we actually have 2 growing seasons but things still grow all year long.

For immediate color, think Pansies. They do wonderful here in the winter, but not sure about starting from seed.
Plan out your garden with short in front and gradually increase the height to the back. Pansies would look nice in front all their smiling faces ;)

Mums are plentiful in the stores now also.

Hi Risa,
That's a huge planter. You're going to have fun planning what to grow there.

My favorite book is Pat Welsh, Southern California Gardening, a Month-by-Month Guide. It tells you what blooms each month, what to fertilize, when to plant- all kinds of good information. There is a checklist at the back of each month that you can use. I keep a list of what blooms in my garden on that page too. Here's what I wrote down for November:

Roses
Pink Bower Vine
Potato Vine
Clematis
Ivy Geraniums
Canna Lilies
Thunbergia Vine
Impatiens (shade)
Daylilies
Diamond Dust Euphorbia (nice!)
Dianthus
Bacopa
Milkweed
Vinca (impressive)
Pansies
Santa Barbara Daisies
Aloe
Bird of Paradise
Calla Lily
Total Recall Iris
Frequent Flyer Iris
Feedback Iris
Brugmansia

The most impressive flower to bloom in November I do not grow: Chrysanthemums. You may be able to buy smallish ones now that will bloom for Thanksgiving. You could plant three of them in the middle of your bed and put a few drifts of vincas and pansies around them. Or yoy could put a rose in the middle or back of the bed with bedding flowers (snapdragons, vincas, pansies, all of those flowers in six-packs at Home Depot).

I don't think there is anything you can plant from seed now that will bloom in November, but perhaps someone else will correct me on that. I don't think sunflowers would stand a chance, especially with this unseasonably cool weather we have been having this year.

Renee

wow, thank you both so much for the suggestions. I will definitely be heading to the library asap. In terms of the planter's issues. It does get full sun, & I recently added a couple bags of compost to it in preparation for whatever was going to go in. The only thing that is kind of strange (to me, at least) is that there are automatic sprinklers that will go on in the planter whenever I put the lawn sprinklers on. I read online that you're not supposed to do overhead watering for certain plants (zinnias), but don't know if this will impact it too much, except that I can't keep it too dry in there or I will dry out the lawn. Thanks again for the great info.

You can cap those sprinkler heads or close them all the way, thats what I do.

My suggestions:
Bachelor Button, Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus)
Blanket Flower (Gaillardia)
Coreopsis (Coreopsis)
Cosmos (Cosmos)
Nicotiana (Nicotiana)
Pansy (Viola)
Petunia (Petunia hybrida)
Pincushion Flower (Scabiosa)
Pinks (Dianthus)
Stock (Matthiola).

Risa, you can also buy little retrofit thingies that go onto the sprinkler riser and turn into a drip line. That would be one way to get the water down below the foliage. I saw some at Home Depot the other day that looked like octopuses (octopi?) and screwed right on to the riser.
Renee

Some of the above suggestions will either not flower in time or won't like the cooler weather. If I were you, I would plant pansies/violas, snapdragons, primroses, ornamental cabbage/kale, and/or mums. If you plant them now or even plant in early October, they will be nice and full by Thanksgiving, and maybe bloom on into next year. And I agree to forget about seeds, you will have to buy plants at this point. Make sure you buy plants that have a lot of buds coming up, not ones that are in full bloom now, or they might be spent by the time the holidays come.

Carla in Sac

Thanks again for all the wonderful info. I promise to upload a photo once it's done.

Risa ... I did a google search on key words "southern california fall blooming plants" and got lots of interesting hits. The one below lists some flowers you may find useful. I was thinking Nandina [no flowers, but lovely, lacy redish foliage] which would look great as a taller background plant. Also using sweet alyssum as a low growing edging or ground cover. If you can find potted cosmos, please consider ... they are just lovely. Also consider butterfly bush as one of the larger plants at rear of planter. Also, if you just wander around a nursery with pen and pad ... write names that you like, size and price . Then at library with the Sunset book, make a chart of plant size from this list. Then on graph paper plot the whole area. Sounds like a lot of work, but so worth it.
Having your whole family over in your new home ... how lovely! One last thing.... please get a cheap notebook and start a garden journal ... in my journal I have separate pages for roses, trees, etc. And then a chart for the garden area. Then month by month listings of jobs done.

Here is a link that might be useful: Blooming plants for Oct. wedding

I checked out borderbarbs website, and although it has some interesting suggestions, I have to disagree that they will work in Fullerton in September-November 2010. That website is all about "heat resistant" plants, and we are having one of the coolest years on record. Since Risa says she is a newbie, I would hate for her to plant a bed full of "heat resistant" plants and then wonder why they are croaking in the upcoming overcast fall Orange County weather, and think she did something wrong. She needs plants that are happy with weather and temps in the 50s and even 40's at night, which is how I came up with my list, above. She will be very unhappy trying to grow Marigolds and Petunias in Fullerton in November.

Carla in Sac

While it is true that we have had a cooler than normal summer, no guarantees that the fall will also be cooler. My thoughts would be to select plants that can flex between some variation in weather.

The link below predicts more Santana winds than 'normal' this fall and winter.[YIKES!] They usually come with heat.

Trying to figure all the factors is probably too complicated for Risa, who is new and wants a beautiful display for her family this fall. It seems logical that some of the 'heat tolerant' plants from that article will do as well in cooler weather.
....snip...."Basically any summer annual you can buy now in your local nursery, for planting should be a good bet for blooming straight through from now to November."

The article did have a good hint ... to have a few 'spare' plants in pots to fill in for any failures. BTW did anyone suggest Lantana? Trailing over the edge of the planter would be striking. The ones in my garden are very forgiving of a variety of exposures from part shade to full on day long sun.

Here is a link that might be useful: La Nina

Did you happen to see the thread about Target stores closing their nursery depts. Bound to be some great sales on flowers or shrubs that you might find useful. Sept. 30 is the end date for the sale.