Take some divisions (if the cold soil will allow) of your perennials while they're still starting, Anne, and pot them up. Some of them will do fine as long as they don't dry out. You do want to leave some for the new owners of your old house, right? A shame to leave just craters . .
We did this with the garden at my daughter's house in Salt Lake City, let's see . . . August 2013. I thought the divisions would all die for sure, but we really had some nice stuff we didn't want to leave behind. Just about everything lived over the first winter in pots, and I planted them all out last spring. Most of them grew and bloomed just fine!
Drew, by L.A. I sure hope you mean Lower Alabama, and not Los Angeles! (most people don't know - we even call the Florida Panhandle "L. A." ) There's no water for gardening in Lost Angeles these days. People are moving away from there.
