An All-American Lawn

For so many Americans, envisioning the home one will buy one day includes--within that image of the dream--a lush green lawn, with or without a white picket fence. Pretty much all stereotypical images of American homes in stereotypical American neighborhoods have an expanse of lawn. Why is that? Even when the environment doesn't really support the upkeep of a verdant green lawn, many will insist on carrying both the financial and labor-intensive burdens to create and maintain one notwithstanding. 

Now, I love the beauty and ambiance of a spread of sweetly designed xeriscaping, and, happily, xeriscaping increasingly claims more and more of the residential sweep in the USA. Especially in dryer regions, xeriscaping means no lawn. In my corner of the planet, though, xeriscaping heralds LUSH amplified. I live next door to rain forests, don't you know. A lawn totally fits into a model xeriscape on the east side of Hawaii Island. It can flourish without a sprinkler system; in fact, it can thrive without a human-arranged water source whatsoever. Of course, other kinds of human-managed amendments--think mowing, fertilization, weed-elimination, etc.--can certainly enhance its presentation.

This month marks three years since I moved into my house. All that time I have puttered in the yard, excavating and arranging rocks, planting this and planting that (courtesy of garden centers at Home Depot, Walmart, and some local sellers as well as from cuttings from neighbors and friends) and then even transplanting on occasion. I have planned and replanned where I would like to put in "the all-American lawn." Early on I dabbled with the possibility of putting in a lawn myself. But when, after three to four hours of blithely laboring in my "vineyard," I continue to come inside to clean up and realize my hips, my arms, my hands--or all of the above--ache, I ultimately concluded that ain't going to happen; my "all-American lawn" will not be installed by me.

So this summer I hired a guy, a professional landscaper, to do a lawn installation for me. And this past week, it has begun. (Well, maybe it actually began several weeks back when my guy arrived at my place to take measurements, but now the more visible process has started.)

First of all, I shall document the process with BEFORE photos:

Front yard.

Back yard.

(So yeah, I have an ongoing battle with weeds, and I lose always.)

Day 1: A truck with one awesomely skilled driver dumps three loads of top soil.

Day 2: Eric--my landscaper guy--flattens and compacts the ground space, and distributes the soil.

Here is how it looked when he finished with the distribution of the soil:

(Hooray for disappearing the weeds...at least for the time being!)

Day 3: Spreading the seed. The seeding process will transpire in two stages. This first stage Eric seeded the area with what he called rye grass. When it grows, it will camouflage the "good seed" from the birds (and, boy howdy, are the birds feasting on the rye grass seed already), and I think it ultimately dies back or something, too. The actual grass will be seeded in about 4 weeks. The seed for the rye grass is quite big. Here are photos, but you may have to use your imagination. 

As long as it rains enough at night I don't have to water. (Yes, I bragged earlier about not needing to water a lawn, but in its initial stages, it can be necessary if we are not having daily rainfall. This week I bought my first water sprinkler in Hawaii and also a second hose--one for the back and one for the front.)

Now I'm wondering what rye grass will look like. I'll take photos!