Prepping the Yard for Autumn

Autumn is my favorite season. To get the yard ready for it, I ended up doing more than I expected I would ever have to do. The lawn is still struggling to flourish, but it is doing better. I was initially hoping to take care of everything in one day, but I eventually just wore myself out in the front yard. I would've had the time to do it, but I just ran out of steam. Hopefully you will understand why as I go down the list...

To start off, I raked up the leaves. We have a giant oak in the front and it's just starting to drop it leaves. So every week we have plenty of leaves to rake (and acorns.....wow, so many acorns). Follow the raking with mowing. I use a manual reel mower which I find great satisfaction in using, but it is a little more work. After mowing came the dethatching. It's a simple task and doesn't take a ton of effort (having the right tool helps), but it's slow going to do it right, so it does end up being pretty exhausting. After that was the aerating. I used a cane-shaped two-holed aerator that you step on the punch holes with. Slightly awkward each time, so multiply that out by several hundred holes for the entire yard. I had to stop a few times to sit and catch my breath. After that I was finally able to overseed the lawn and seed the bare spots, followed by fertilizing, followed by a limestone treatment. Phew!

By noon I was spent. I was done. I was...not looking forward to doing the same thing to the back yard. So I'm taking that one in steps. I'm up to having about 2/3 of the aerating completed. I'll have to still mow again, and the leaves keep coming down faster and faster, so that will continue as well. Luckily, I'll only have to do about half of all this - again - in the spring.