Hi Jeson, welcome to ATP,
I guess it is important not to over reach yourself when you start gardening, and commit yourself to too many plants and too many beds. Have a little success with a finite manageable area, rather than a large amount of work that takes a couple of seasons to mature into anything.
Also only spend one hour in a nursery for each 8 hours in your garden. It is easy to spend money and end up with plants you don't know what to do with, which then die in pots. However wandering around nurseries with your hands in your pockets for hours and days is a great investment.
Before you do a lot of gardening, do a little, maybe with a bed that is 8ft long by three feet wide.
* Mark out the bed and watch the sun go around it. What goes in the bed should fit the light and sun hitting it.
* Next consider the ground you are putting the plants into, and invest time in it improving it and making it a tremendous medium in which to plant. It makes the bed easier to work with every day you plant and weed.
* Buy great plants, healthy young well grown plants, and maybe pay an extra dollar to support a proper nursery and get ten dollars of free advice every day you go there.
* Have a watering point nearby to the bed.
* Pick a plant you like, and learn a lot about it, history, famous garden examples, best growers, investigate and choose a couple of smashers preferably plants with awards or with the Award of Garden Merit from the RHS ( see Royal Horticultural Society website).
* Gardeners are generous people, with advice , encouragement, and plant gifts, so join a society, find some kindred spirits near you, and join the community.
I bought a couple of nice miniature Japanese acers, and brought them back when all the leaves dried up and dropped off. It was humiliating to be told they were deciduous, so there aren't any mistakes you will make that we didn't all make, and there aren't any stupid questions.
Grow beautiful plants that make you happy every time you see them, and remember, gardening is a journey, not an event. There is no rush.
There is a Rose forum on this site, and like all the separate fora, some people know a lot, and they help everybody else.
