I seriously don't know what to do differently.  I want someone to come to my yard and tell me what to do.  We bought a book (and READ IT, TOO!), we put seeds in the ground, they came up...and then everything got eaten by bugs, slugs, and birds.  *sigh*  

We were going to do a gardening blog last year, but everything went so badly that we didn't continue.  Hope yours goes much better this year!