Gardening in the south?

I did live in the Largo, Florida area for about 4 years in the 90's and one of the years I did have some tomatoes and eggplant in my garden, but other than that and a pineapple that I grew from the top of one purchased at the store, I have no experience with gardening in the warmer climates.   In Iowa, winter is obviously not a very active gardening season, but here in Florida, apparently gardening is a year round sport.  With 3/4 of an acre of land, I am eager to start doing something, but just not sure where to start, or what to focus on.

 Since 2002 when I purchased a house in Iowa, I have always tended to bite off more than I can chew as a gardener, meaning I see a pretty plant in the store, purchase a number of them, then let them sit on the patio until they are almost dead, and frantically try to find a place to plant them before they die completely.  I would randomly plant something somewhere just to save its life and so ended up with quite a mishmash of things here there and everywhere in my back yard.  I had a half started patio by the garage, a half started medicinal herb garden by the patio, and an empty trellis that Don built for me just begging for a vine of some sort to climb up it.  I had cleared an area for a garden, but then didn't plant, so had a huge weed patch for a few summers.  I then focused on that area the next summer and ended up with a huge weed patch behind my garage the next summer.  You see a pattern here?  For the past 3 years, I just wanted to take back control of the yard and finish all my half started projects, but the summer I realized I had a mess, I was so bummed about my job I just didn't have the energy or motivation to do much.  Then the next summer it was too hot, and the next year I moved.  So, the poor yard never got done, and whoever purchases it now will really have their hands full!   While I did have some nice plants and a lot of potential, I just never got a handle on it, and to me that is a big disappointment.    So, bottom line, I do NOT want to end up with a mess on my hands this time, and I want to do things the right way.

This is one of the few areas of my yard in Iowa that was not out of control.  It was on the side of the house right by the driveway and while I am typically afraid of spiders, I left this little lady alone all summer and was fine as long as I could see her here in her web. 

Luckily I have Donald, who is a planner by nature.  Now that I realize I have a compulsion to just jump into things too quickly without thinking them through, I am trying to curb that behavior and work with Don instead of against him as I have in the past # of years.   A number of years ago, 3 different times, he spent hours on the computer making a graph for the yard showing what we should plant where, and each year I'd go and mess it up by not following the plan.  Eventually he got frustrated and stopped helping, and whenever I'd complain, I'd have to hear about if I'd only followed the plan, things would have been fine.  Whenever I start making noises about doing something in our yard now, he reminds me of my past attempts and so far I have been good about refraining from taking any action. It has been relatively easy to refrain so far, since it has been too hot to do much outside, and since we have had very little income and I am being very careful not to purchase unnecessary items until our income becomes more regular.  

A few things are changing that are causing me to become more antsy and I can feel my spontaneous gardener self getting impatient.  As the summer is winding down, the weather is going to start getting cooler and I will want to be outside more, plus, from what I am learning so far, September is a good time to start the fall/winter garden here in Florida.  We also have quite a few pet sitting gigs coming up in Aug/Sept, so I want to spend all the profits we make on garden items.  Donald, however, says no, that we have to put the profits back into the business and maybe only get a few garden items.  I know he's right, but it is still difficult to wait.  

This is the front yard of my home in Florida.  Lots of shade. There is a nice sunny area in the middle that will be good for a veggie garden, and I have ideas for a faerie garden in the circle of trees here. 

So, I am going to TRY and actually plan instead of take half a$$ed action like I usually do.   I really want to start an herb garden with medicinal herbs, aromatic herbs and culinary herbs.  I can do research, that may help take my mind off of the fun part of purchasing things haphazardly.  I also want to get more serious about vegetables.  In the past, I usually had tomatoes and peppers, not much else.  I would love to be a real gardener and have all sorts of veggies and be able to preserve things for later use.   Again...these things take research and planning!!!!   I am going to try really hard to do the right thing here.  Patience is a virtue!  

Meanwhile, Donald came home with a pizza and I'm going to go chill out w/ him for the rest of the evening.   I'll start planning first thing tomorrow!