Starting with your drainage, if you had someone do the finish grading, then the soil level is done. You don't need to add any topsoil. Anything you add now will ruin the existing drainage...which was set by a professional drainage guy. Why would you want to mess that up? Is something wrong with your gutter drainage? All this is brand new and already you want to "fix" it. I don't understand. It seems like you're spending money just spend it. If you are worried you won't be spending enough, then get started with organic gardening. I'm not saying it is necessarily more expensive, but it can be. Why? Because you cannot overapply organic fertilizer. The more you use the better everything looks. With chemical ferts, there is a limit and beyond that you will kill the plants. So I'm saying that organic allows you to spend money. You don't need to, though. Having said that, there is a way to kill your grass with organics. All you have to do is apply too much compost, or worse, manure, to your lawn. One of my neighbors did that last weekend. Now the neighborhood stinks and her lawn will be dead for a couple years. But I digress... If you have sandy soil, just thank your lucky stars and put in a garden. Topsoil is highly over rated in my opinion. My lot was washed out from 4 to 6 inches deep when we got the house. We used topsoil for most of it and sand in the back. The only place with really great grass is the sandy part in back. You can see a distinct line where the sand stops and the native topsoil begins. The sandy part is deep green and the topsoil part is yellow. Why is that? Our native topsoil is mostly crushed limestone with a pH of 8. Sand is crushed quartz and granite with a pH of 7. Then again, your sand may have other minerals in it. You might want to get a soil test. But the point is, don't bring in topsoil just to bring in topsoil. All the grading has been done by people who know what they are doing. Adding topsoil, even 1/4-inch every year, is one of the worst ideas in lawn care. If you have a golf course with no buildings, curbing, or concrete, then fine. But for the average home owner, it leads to a big mess as time goes by. I have pictures of lawns where the owner added far too much topsoil. I'll post one at the end of my rant. As for grass: You missed a great opportunity to install your lawn last fall. Had you done it then your grass would have sturdy roots by now that will be able to resist the summer heat when it comes in June and July. You would also have a relatively weed free lawn because the main annual lawn weed, crabgrass, dies out in the fall leaving your grass time to thicken up to keep it out. Now you are doomed to spring lawn he!!. If you seed a new lawn in the spring, all the crabgrass seed will be sprouting along with the grass. Crabgrass sprouts fast and grows fast. Since it is an annual plant, its roots harden fast and furious. It will easily take over when your newly planted target grass weakens and thins. The only easy way around that is to use sod to start an instant lawn. Sod is already thick and dense and has hardened roots. However, sod is expensive. I suggest you save all the money you were going to spend for grading and topsoil and spend that money on sod instead of seed. Which sod/seed? I'll leave that up to my Yankee friends. A lot of people in the nawth use a blend of Kentucky bluegrass and turf type tall fescue (TTTF). The KBG will spread and thicken to fill in and become very dense. It will also become dormant and turn brown in the winter. The fescue will be green all year (only redeeming feature in my opinion). Fescue is a thin turf unless and until you get enough seed on the ground. The usually requires reseeding every fall until you get it right. KBG spreads without reseeding and makes a very nice lawn. Here is a friend of mine's KBG lawn in Southern California (very near the Pacific). He fertilizes with used coffee grounds from Starbucks once or twice a year. From the satellite view of his neighborhood, he clearly has the nicest lawn in the area. There are many different varieties of KBG and fescue. That is what I'll leave up to the others. They will ultimately send you to NTEP to get information for grass performance in your particular area. Don't install the sprinklers until the garden and lawn is in. All kinds of design changes can come about between now and then which would ruin your preestablished ideas about watering. As for the actual installation, there is a much better forum here at GW for sprinklers. Go there, not here, for sprinkler advice. Too much topsoil. I have other pictures of this same neighborhood showing that the original soil level was at or below the concrete sidewalks.

mooserider, the soil test kit you have will give you a pH number but it will not tell you whether that number is where its at because of the Calcium or Magnesium in your soil. How will you know what those numbers are and if they are in balance? If the infromation you provide the soil test lab includes that you want a soil pH of X.X they can supply the information you need to know about how to get it there without guessing. Nitrogen levels are dependant on your soils temperature which determines how active the Soil Food Web is. So that value in March may have little to do with what is there in June. Few soil testing labs test for N anymore for that reason. A good reliable soil test, not a test kit from a garden center, will also be able to tell you whether your P, K, Ca, and Mg are in balance, not just that you are deficient or have too much, as well as what you might need to do to correct any problems so you need not guess. Why some people think knowledge, ie. knowing what your soils nutrients and pH are, is bad or unnecessary is beyond me.

The "soil Test" kits sold in most garden centers are very unreliable and I have found, as have many other people, that the pH test often gives you the same pH reading with vinegar and baking soda as your garden soil. For good soil tests contact your local office of the University of Kentucky USDA Cooperative Extension Service and have them do it. Current cost in Michigan for a soil test done by Michigan State University School of Agriculture is $12.00 per sample and you get much more information ahbout your soil. While waiting for those results dig in with these simple soil tests to learn more about the soil (clay is a soil type and there are many different types of clay) you have: 1) Structure. From that soil sample put enough of the rest to make a 4 inch level in a clear 1 quart jar, with a tight fitting lid. Fill that jar with water and replace the lid, tightly. Shake the jar vigorously and then let it stand for 24 hours. Your soil will settle out according to soil particle size and weight. A good loam will have about 1-3/4 inch (about 45%) of sand on the bottom. about 1 inch (about 25%) of silt next, about 1 inch (25%) of clay above that, and about 1/4 inch (about 5%) of organic matter on the top. 2) Drainage. Dig a hole 1 foot square and 1 foot deep and fill that with water. After that water drains away refill the hole with more water and time how long it takes that to drain away. Anything less than 2 hours and your soil drains too quickly and needs more organic matter to slow that drainage down. Anything over 6 hours and the soil drains too slowly and needs lots of organic matter to speed it up. 3) Tilth. Take a handful of your slightly damp soil and squeeze it tightly. When the pressure is released the soil should hold together in that clump, but when poked with a finger that clump should fall apart. 4) Smell. What does your soil smell like? A pleasant, rich earthy odor? Putrid, offensive, repugnant odor? The more organic matter in your soil the more active the soil bacteria will be and the nicer you soil will smell. 5) Life. How many earthworms per shovel full were there? 5 or more indicates a pretty healthy soil. Fewer than 5, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, indicates a soil that is not healthy. Here is a link that might be useful: University of Kentucky CES

This one sells for under $40, allows for 2 point calibration (pH 7 and one other - you pick the other), and works quite well, so long as you care for it properly and calibrate it with proper pH calibration buffers. Three Extension Specialist from Missouri evaluated colorimetric soil test kits, hand held pH meters and soil pH test probes for field evaluation of soil pH. Their wrok is published in this paper. Quoting from the conclusion: Soil test pH kits can be used by Extension agents to quickly determine whether soil acidity or alkalinity is a probable cause of poor crop health. Hand-held pH meters and pH color indicator kits were found to provide reliable in-field soil pH measurements. Personnel using a pH color kit were able to distinguished between soils with and without lime. However, interpolating between whole pH values with the color kit was difficult. A soil probe that was inserted into moist soil in plots provided poor response to soil pH and is not suitable for diagnosis of soil pH problems. Speaking as a retired reaserch chemist with over 30 years of laboratory research experience I can tell you with certainty that the way to test a pH meter is not with a vinegar solution. It is way too variable, and unless your testing comparable pH solution, the range in which you would be testing is far too acidic to meaningful for a pH test in the range of 6-8. If you want to test you pH meter, get a calibration buffer.