Hey Rose,

Sorry no one has answered your question yet. At least for me, it's a hard thing to do to give plant suggestions without seeing the location and being familiar with site conditions.

You may have heard this before, but I think it's good advice...look around your neighborhood and see what catches your eye. What does good for a neighbor with similar conditions to yours, should do well for you. Also, local nurseries should be able to tell you what they've had luck with. However, don't take everything you hear from the nursery as the final answer. Collect ideas from multiple sources and pick what seems best or most likely correct to you.

Once you make some selections, post them here and I'll bet you can get more feedback. People with experience with a particular plant can tell you what worked or didn't work for them. It's a lot easier to tell about personal experiences than to try to make decisions or design suggestions for someone else.

I agree with the above, and am curious which plants you've tried. Planting in full sun is very difficult if you aren't a dedicated waterer (at least until the plantings get established). However, here are a few of my favorites for the sun garden:
Boxwoods are generally everyone's first pick when looking for an (evergreen,) easily shapeable shrub. You can turn rows of them into small, curving lines around the porch, or have big round globes against the house, or probably even animal shapes, if you're into that sort of thing ;)
Coneflowers, Sedum, Daylilies, Salvia, Tall Phlox, Aster, Black Eyed Susan, Coreopsis, Dianthus, Joe Pye Weed, Variegated Monkey Grass, Crocosmia, Iris, Hardy Hibiscus, Bee Balm, Catmint, Lobelia Cardinalis, Milkweed. Those are just the more common plants that do really well in the middle of summer, here, for me. I suggest going to Lowes or somewhere, and looking through the magazines they have on gardening.. You can pick out flowers you like in them, and get inspiration from the articles.

One thats a safe bet would be a hydrangea. They are fairly hardy and would bring that color that your looking for. Another might be the knock out rose. They seem to be fairly hardy as well, with the color you're looking for. Good luck and happy gardening!

I'm in zone 6 too and have had a hard time. I finally realized that bulbs do very well and the plants listed in the above posts. I'll add cotton, which is related to hibiscus and mallows which grow here, sage, sweet pea (I have some seed I could give you), Mist flower, angelonia, sea thrift, bachelor button, bee balm, peony, ajuga, yarrow, ironweed, beefsteak plant....