Looking for some input & advice about my landscape design! PICS

Hi everyone! So, I'm looking for some advice/opinions about a landscape design I created for my backyard. I'm pretty new to gardening in general, my only experience has been with a couple of indoor & outdoor plants and a few years with a veggie garden; My mom has always been the gardener of the family But in the past year or two, I've taken a real interest in it, probably due to my love for living a healthy and organic lifestyle.
This year, I decided to re-do part of my landscape in the backyard - it's the space right up against the back wall of my house; the shape of the house + porch creates a little square area. My parents did plant the area years ago, but we all felt it was in need of a little updating Here is the design:


http://i942.photobucket.com/albums/ad266/liviluvslilly13/LandscapeDesigncopy_zps01eae979.jpg

Any advice regarding the plant selections, layout, and/or anything else you can think of would be much appreciated! Here are a couple of my concerns:

- Did I incorporate too many varieties of plants and not "repeat" them enough in the design? In other words, will the space look jumbled and random?
- Based on my plant choices, will the area be appealing year-round (not so much in the winter, as I know that many gardens loose their visual appeal during the winter months, but more during the spring, summer, and fall)?
- Is the garden going to require a lot of maintenance every year?

A couple of side notes: The two chicken coops are already there, I just wanted to put that into the design to see it as a whole. The Lilac tree and raspberry bush are also already in that area.

Finally, what would you recommend using as a mulch? As of right now, we just have a layer of white stone. All of that will be removed, and were going to put some sort of mulch down to protect the plants - any opinions?


Thank you so much for any input you give - it's greatly appreciated!

 

Haha, thank you I'm really no good at it either - hopefully it will turn out O.K!