I'm looking for a relatively small (3 to 5 foot height and spread) shrub, with rounded growing habit and redish/purplish/or really dark green foliage.

The best option my wife and I have seen at the local nursury (Culvers in Marion) is Wine and Roses Weigela. However, we have not seen any growing specimens locally and we are concerned that it gets a bit leggy and dosent fill in very well (as far as we can tell from pictures we have found on the net). My wife is pretty picky about plants appearing "neat" and she is really turned off by what we've seen about it's form. However, it's foliage is exactly the color we want (a nice mix of red and green). If anyone has any experience with weigela's and can shed some light on their form for us, we'd appriciate it.

The obvious choise is barberry, but I'd really like to stay away from that. First off, the thorns are a dealbreaker for me, not kid friendly or pruner (me) friendly. I also have read these are quite invasive. Plus, everybody and their brother has them, and I prefer to avoid using extremely common plants in my landscaping. So, with Barberry, it's got it's 3 strikes, so in my mind, it's out.

So after that, we run out of ideas. There's dark ninebarks, but those are neither mounding or "neat" looking so they don't fit the bill either. And beyond that, we just don't see any other options. Any suggestions??

You could try holly. Nice deep green folliage with red berries in the fall. Light pruning should keep it shaped up. You need a male and female plant if you want berries and make sure it is hardy in your area.

I don't know much about pruning - I pretty much let my shrubs go natural. Could by my lazy gardener gene. Let us know what you finally decide on.

Cricket

Marilou, thanks for the link, that looks like good stuff. I'll read it throughly later tonight.

-Pam