July 25th progress

This is all the work the guys got done over the week and weekend after the 4th of July

And continuing the last weekend of July 

Grass update

My dad has been pestering me for this for a while, so after mowing and weeding for several hours this afternoon, I finally got around to snapping some photos of the lawn which are up to date. Above is a view from the back, which as you can see is not as full as the front, and has areas with weed problems.

below are some of the better spots













Unfortunately, not everything has come up this good. There are some areas where I am having troubles getting the grass to really take

First cut

After a long and stressful week at work, I left early today and came home to cut my lawn for the first time. It's not the US open, but its pretty good for an amateur and only a month in.

work day

The weather has been rainy for the whole week, and today was the first warm and sunny day that we've had. So today I spread some fertilizer on the yard, pulled up the last on the burlap and ran the roller over the whole yard one last time. Below are some before and after pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Before

After

growing grass

I had intended to chronicle all the effort into bringing in 75 yards of topsoil, leveling it out, and preparing it for grass seed etc. But i never got around to it. Instead, here are some pictures of the progression of the land.

before topsoil

The first seedling -- one week after planting

A view from today -- one week afer the first seedling popped up

End of rock farming

My yard raking days are nearly over. Today the guys from Hamlin construction came by and hauled away my collection and took it over to a job site a few houses down. Their help, and bobcat, are greatly appreciated. Here are the before and after photos.

Curby

The girls absolutely loved the 2.5 tons of sand that was delivered, must have been like Christmas for them. I must say that I do have an excellent group of friends! This last weekend we laid down curbing around the house and created a tree ring in the front. This required almost 30 hours of preparation time by me mostly consisting of try to level and compact the ground where the curbing would go, and only 5 hours to install all the curbing and clean up all of the equipment. As with most home improvement projects it seems as though the prep work is both the hardest and the most important. Now to the part that you really want to see, the pictures!