Hello from Cumbria (South Lakeland actually)

[merlot madam]

Hi there,
I'm about to become a full-time retiree in 1 month's time. Hence I have no more excuses about not tending to the garden! Other hobbies WILL include wine making (hence 'merlot madam') and doll's house making, and family history and cooking and entertaining and.... NO, I MUST get on with my garden!
Seriously, I live in a village with beautiful gardens - even a horticultural society and 'Open Gardens Day' - I have a lot to live up to!
First question - ideas for the front garden. At present small rectangular, west facing, boundary a low wall (not to be changed) covered in ivy and cotoneaster ( I think), several lovely rose bushes and a variety of shrubs arranged around the soakaway. The surveyor who came when I bought the house said it was 'old fashioned'. Any ideas?

[Flummery]

Hi and welcome Merlot Madam. Never mind the surveyor - what you YOU feel about it? Our front garden was a lawn with overgrown shrubs surrounding it. The first thing I did was to dig a small pond and make a bed for perennials in the centre of this. The pond has a huge (now) march marigold in it and blends into the flower bed beautifully. I eventually got fed up of mowing what turned into just a path of grass between the hard-pruned and planted up borders and the island in the centre. It is now a bark chip path and the far end near the garden wall is my 'woodland' garden.

Is there lawn? Are you happy with it? Do you want to make a path through it - straight or snaking? Do you want flowering plants? I love perennials because you don't have to 'do' them every year and you can collect them one or two at a time. It's all your choice - good luck with it.