A lawn master named morpheuspa is caring for two lawns - his and his mother's. His is all improved Elite cultivars. His mother's is contractor grade. The mother's lawn is gorgeous due to his care. I believe he has demonstrated that even contractor grade Kentucky bluegrass can be the best lawn on the block if you get the soil tuned up and follow proper care. In fact here is a pic of his mother's lawn... If you want the best lawn in the neighborhood, then the Logan Labs soil test is necessary. New seed may not be necessary. I would see what you can accomplish this summer and, about mid-August, decide whether you need different grass. Renovating is a lot of work followed by a lot of stress waiting for the seed to come in. Then you are faced with a 3-year wait as the grass plants mature. If you already have mature grass, I would just make the very best of it first before jumping into the pool of renovation. But also necessary is mastering the basics of lawn care as follows... Basics of Lawn Care After reading numerous books and magazines on lawn care, caring for lawns at seven houses in my life, and reading numerous forums where real people write in to discuss their successes and failures, I have decided to side with the real people and dispense with the book and magazine authors. I don't know what star their planet rotates around but it's not mine. With that in mind, here is the collected wisdom of the Internet savvy homeowners and lawn care professionals summarized in a few words. If you follow the advice here you will have conquered at least 50% of all lawn problems. Once you have these three elements mastered, then you can worry about weeds (if you have any), dog spots, and striping your lawn. But if you are not doing these three things, they will be the first three things suggested for you to correct. Watering Water deeply and infrequently. Deeply means at least an inch in every zone, all at once. Infrequently means monthly during the cool months and no more than weekly during the hottest part of summer. Do not spread this out and water for 10 minutes every day. If your grass looks dry before the month/week is up, water longer next time. If that does not work, then you might have to water more than once per week during the summer's hottest period. Deep watering grows deep, drought resistant roots. Infrequent watering allows the top layer of soil to dry completely which kills off many shallow rooted weeds. You will have to learn to judge when to water your own lawn. If you live in Las Vegas your watering will be different than if you live in Vermont. Adjust your watering to your type of grass, humidity, wind, and soil type. It is worth noting that this technique is used successfully by professionals in Phoenix, so...just sayin.' The other factors make a difference. If you normally water 1 inch per week and you get 1/2 inch of rain, then adjust and water only 1/2 inch that week. Mowing Every week mulch mow at the highest setting on your mower. Most grasses are the most dense when mowed tall. However, bermuda, centipede, and bent grasses will become the most dense when they are mowed at the lowest setting on your mower. In fact there are special mowers that can mow these grasses down to 1/16 inch. Dense grass shades out weeds, keeps the soil cooler, and uses less water than thin grass. Tall grass can feed the deep roots you developed in #1 above. Tall grass does not grow faster than short grass nor does it look shaggy sooner. Once all your grass is at the same height, tall grass just looks plush. Fertilizing Fertilize regularly. I fertilize 5 times per year using organic fertilizer. Which fertilizer you use is much less important than numbers 1 and 2 above. Follow the directions on the bag and do not overdo it. Too little is better than too much. At this point you do not have to worry about weed and feed products - remember at this point you are just trying to grow grass, not perfect it. Besides once you are doing these three things correctly, your weed problems should go away without herbicide. It is too late to fertilize with chemical fertilizers this summer; however, you can still fertilize with organics all summer long. You can start with organics before you get your soil test back - you will always have a nitrogen deficiency. Between the basic lawn care (water and mowing), organic ferts, and the corrections to micro nutrients prescribed by the soil test, your lawn should look amazing by August. You can introduce yourself to organic lawn care by applying alfalfa pellets (rabbit chow) at a rate of 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. No, you won't be overrun by rabbits. They only eat rabbit food when confined and fed nothing else. Get the alfalfa pellets at any feed store. Check prices between rabbit chow and alfalfa pellets. They are the same product but sometimes there is a difference from brown bag to brown bag. Spray the soap and molasses and you are officially on your way.

--- "Yeah I'm in PA, not to far from NJ and Philly. I'm looking for a used hot tub, I didnt want to outlay 8k in these uncertain times. So I thought I could find something that would last us a few years until we get out of this awful recession. I am holding out for the right deal and I dont want somebody else's junk. A moving sale would be ideal!" --- Why not place a few ads stating that you're looking for a used hot tub? There may be someone near you who doesn't use their tub and would welcome the opportunity to have it removed. I'm a home inspector. It's not unheard of to find a hot tub staying with the house and the buyer saying that they don't want it. Maybe you can contact some home inspectors in your area and offer them a finders fee if they would run into a similar situation and you work out a deal for a tub. --- "How on earth did you find the website design on a msg board? You are a true inpector indeed. I dont even think it's the 'real' Whirlpool name that we all know since they are using a hyphen in their spelling." --- I Googled the name. That message board was the first result - ahead of the website itself. Now THAT tells you something. I think it's safe to say that the appliance company is in no way related. --- "I read your post twice, I only see one contradiction where they say 'they work with whirl-spa manufacturers' but their biz name indicates THEY ARE the manufacturer. Plus on their 'About Us' page they indicate they are the 3rd largest spa manufacturer in the world. They certainly dont appear to live up to that, per their dinky site." --- Well, -I- went back and read it carefully, and it's only four. Oops. You picked up the most blatant one. Two of the others are similar: They claim to have been contracted to liquidate excess inventory, but yet they also claim to be the manufacturer, and they take pride instead of we take pride. Also, the claim of selling dirt cheap to avoid additional storage and transportation fees does not jibe with the reason they are being liquidated. There are also a few minor errors that a large, legit company simply wouldn't have on their website, such as capitalizing dealer and not capitalizing Home Depot. For having been in business 15 years, it's mighty strange that the domain name has only been registered since July 15, 2008. It was registered through GoDaddy, something that I doubt the third largest spa manufacturer in the world would do. A whois search revealed the registrant is Lianna Lawson. Ms. Lawson had a candle company called Winning Wicks that she apparently operated out of her home in Jonesborough, Tennessee. I say HAD, because there doesn't seem to be an active web site for the company. I'm guessing that the candle company folded and she's now selling hot tubs out of her house, over the internet. Joe Here is a link that might be useful: Winning Wicks

Sophie - I disagree. I did not design this. I have no pretensions to being a designer and for many other aspects of the renovation we have indeed had formal plans drawn up. [I also know from experience that having an architect involved is far from a panacea .... but that's another story or stories]. For this room we knew we needed to replace the large leaky picture window and instead of replacing in kind we asked whether it would be possible and reasonable to build a window seat and what would be involved. We showed the contractor many pictures of window seats and shared the required dimension ranges (not exact dimensions) from various articles. He said a bay window would take care of it and no separate plans were required. I include the manufacturer's literature excerpt that says their Bay and Bow windows can be used as window seats. It seemed (and actually still seems) a reasonable solution. Projection Window Bay and Bow windows are like a piece of fine furniture for the façade of your home. These unique windows project from your home, creating additional space that can be used for a variety of purposes, such as a window seat or displaying meaningful trinkets. Our vinyl windows (typically double-hung or casement windows) are inserted into a solid frame to create this unique look that adds style to any home. Bay windows typically have three lites (one central fixed lite and two flanking operational lites) at 20-25-degree angles. Bow windows most commonly consist of four lites, all of which can be fixed or operational, set at 10-15 degree angles. The contractor asked us to describe what we wanted to the window vendor as well and we did. We never used the term bay window. We only talked in terms of window seat. The window vendor also did not dissuade us or suggest we needed an addition instead of a window. The window vendor spec'd the window we needed. Given that we have 8 foot ceilings - this would have been a really good place to catch that a 52" bay window wouldn't be long enough to provide a seat at a reasonable height off the floor. I think that's the key flaw here - plus someone's telling us that (unless I'm wrong) we weren't going to get the wood backing. Tomorrow should be interesting ...

I love the composition of the windows at your home's lower level.....the horizontal feel of the transoms above the picture windows is quite well done. The gable garage volume.....is that an addition? It feels a bit out of step with the lower level to me. My suggestion would be to consider reframing the window openings over the garage to match with or more closely align with the design of the windows at the lower level. I'd align these windows with the width of the garage door, then add millwork around the entire composition top-to-bottom to bring it all together. I think I'd paint it all, including the garage door, the same color as the body of your home -- creating a monolithic look, just like was done at the lower level windows. I sketched the concept below, and included a photo of a chalet that conveys a similar notion about window composition. I'd resist the urge to place more window space at the peak of that gable.