Thinking maybe doing this with some more landscape

I would do a curved walkway.

I like the curved walkway epically since your house has a lot of angles.

You could also do a flagstone walk. If you keep your desk and redo it don’t do all gray. Use some materials that help warm it up.
I couldn’t get Ai to butt the driveway up to the deck so the landscaping wouldn’t be possible in the front. But you could add a couple of potted ferns to add to set on the deck bench to liven it up instead.

I don't undrstand the proposals for removing the deck. It looks like you are lowering the door down to ground level? And the siding goes all the way down to the ground - don't you have any foundation?

Ai moves the door down but it would need a step or two up to the door.

AI moves *everything* around. To the extent that most of the images are useless.

Are you planning on removing the tree in the middle of the current deck? If you aren't, you will have to account for the root flare of the tree. An on-grade sidewalk is going to have to avoid the root flare, so it will probably end up very close to the house. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it will affect the landscaping design.

You still need steps to the door threshold. Here I shortened the deck and added horizontal cable or steel for the rails. Stain the deck dark brown.

Apparently you don't use the deck?

In our last house, the 25-yr-old cedar deck was warped, splintery, and uncomfortable to walk on. When we replaced it with composite (and spruced it up with white railings), we started using it a lot more.

Is there anything you can do to the deck to encourage you to use it?

Mad_gallica makes an excellent point regarding the tree.

Another option, which preserves the tree, is to reduce the size of the deck to porch size. Stay within the tree and the post, leaving the steps in the same location. This opens up a lot of space for plantings.

Thanks everyone I think I’m leaning more to having landscaping up there. We have a big deck in the back so we really never sit up there.

One more idea is to keep a portion of the deck (or redo completely) - can even be a small deck out the front door and then walkway to driveway.