If you post your yard photo here,you could get exact suggest.

Personally, I think the first step is to decide how you want to use the space - recreation, areas for kids, entertaining - and if there are any particular types of gardens that you like (e.g., roses). These will help you come up with some goals. Look also at surrounding homes and decide if you want to coordinate (they have formal landscaping and you want to match) or do your own thing.

For privacy plants, consider a mixed screen of both evergreen and deciduous. This lets you have more choices (including some flowering choices), minimize issues with diseases attacking a row of the same plants, and get more than just a boring row of shrubs/trees.

I don't think the shape is so unusual, but perhaps just different than what you are used to.

Recommend also that you post to the Alabama forum here on Gardenweb.

Hi, karen.

I think you might be interested in laag's before-and-after designs for a wide, shallow backyard on this thread:
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/design/msg091804247726.html?11

I'm not a pro, but it seems to me that some of the tactics he used to de-emphasize the narrowness include:

= filling in one end of the yard with a deep bed.

= de-emphasizing the rectangularity of the yard by having a non-rectangular lawn. He does this by having deeper beds near the fence in one area and near the house in another area: in other words, the lawn is a sort of zig-zag shape rather than a rectangle with rounded corners. [I've seen the same tactic used in a narrow side yard by having a path that isn't straight, but meanders from near the house to near the fence.]

Your yard is different -- and smaller -- but you might try the same tactics.