Can you recommend some basic planting please

[Chaosx3x]

We have quite a big garden that we haven’t done much with. Feeling a bit overwhelmed by it and we have 3 young kids so don’t have much time. However it would be nice to do some planting with them as an activity occasionally and would like a bit of colour - we have two sort of raised bed areas (our garden is on a slope so we used sleepers to section it) and would love to have some year round colour. I thought about doing bulbs but would have to plant so many different ones to get variation across the year? I don’t really know what I’m doing 😂 but grateful for any ideas! Thanks

There are plants that come back each year (perennials) so I'd plant a few of them. I personally love hydrangeas, roses and geums because they can bloom from Spring through to late Autumn.
The there are annual plants (bedding plants) that last thought the summer and then die when the frosts come in autumn. Every year in late April/early May I'll go and buy loads of bedding plants and fill my beds with colour. It's my favourite thing to do!! I've tried so many bedding plants I now know which ones are resistant to slugs. My favourites are geraniums, begonias, snap dragons, osteopermums. These all flower from May to October, sometimes they even survive the winter (if you're lucky!) and don't seem to get bothered by slugs and snails.
Yes you can plant bulbs but I don't bother because once they've finished flowering you're supposed to leave them untouched for 6 weeks. This means I can't plant my bedding plants because the beds are full of dead tulips, daffodils etc! I do plant them in the lawn, but not the beds.

Bulbs are only for spring, so they won't see you through the year.

And to get the garden looking great year round, you need to be really experienced, so I would suggest just concentrating on, say, May to October.

Here are a few tried and tested low maintenance, pest/disease-resistant suggestions. (I can't be bothered with high maintenance... )

Salvia Amistad
Geranium Rozanne
Verbena Bonariensis

they all flower through to mid-late autumn.

Lavender Hidcote or Munstead
Acanthus Rue Ledan

And direct sow some seeds of Nigella papillosa 'African Bride' and Papaver orientale 'Royal Wedding' - both sold by Chilternseeds.co.uk. These are pretty white annuals, so only last for a year.

Salvia Amistad is almost enough in itself. Grows tall and spreads wide, flowers endlessly well into October and beyond, and bees love it.

A short cut is one of these (lots of companies doing them)

https://www.wilko.com/en-uk/garden-on-a-roll-mixed-sunny-border-2m-x-40cm/p/0529617?gadsource=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwwe2wBhAEEiwAyFFFoytDtVDb2m6OyOSWv4-QcqEnhUhTmNwgVgIMpRHy5UpXUnCQQ4sgRoCFzsQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

I'm sure the plants could be sourced cheaper/better quality, but in terms of convenience I don't think this sort of thing can be beaten.