Here goes, Bart. Lavender lass, I sure wish my garden had a few horses wandering around. Fenced from the garden, of course. That's what my property was when I bought it in 1978, a horse pasture with native alder, maple, hemlock and Doug fir. I rented a bulldozer and put in a driveway and cleared an area for a manufactured home. After that was done an acquaintance needed a place to store his bulldozer. My place was the logical choice. He said I could run it as much as I wanted as long as I kept it full of fluids. After a couple of years I had dug 12 ponds and cleared a lot of land and started growing plants for my landscaping business, focusing on the not so common plants and buying the more common ones wholesale. I propagated them from seeds and cuttings. Made a lot of trades too. Along the way I kept planting trees and shrubs for myself and slowly phasing out the nursery beds. Most of them went through several moves before they found a permanent home. Now, after 35 years, I'm doing a lot of editing. That means cutting lower branches off some trees and sawing down others. I'm even turning the larger rhododendrons in to trees by pruning them to look like trees. Lately I'm concentrating on planting more groundcovers and enlarging and redoing a rock garden. Every so often almost every part of the garden needs a reshuffle. That's the fun part! I really enjoy my neighbor's horse in the pasture next door. He also raises a couple of Angus each summer for beef. Lavender lass, there IS country on this side of the state. ;-) Mike...from Peone Prairie near Mt. Spokane

I am glad to hear I am not the only one with these little lovelies!! I did go through and weed them all out yesterday and it was very easy and quick. So, I won't complain too much. I am trying a different kind of garden soil on the next bed I am finishing. We'll see if that helps or hinders. I did find a blown-in dandelion sitting in one bed yesterday. We have had a lot of wind, so I expect that is my culprit. Thanks for all the input, I am looking forward to a fun summer of gardening and pulling those little devil weeds! See below, I have added a picture of my new garden - I love it!!! I can't wait to finish it. The curbed in place to the left will be for my corn and pumpkins, we grow lots of pumpkins!! Can someone help me out on this adding a picture thing: I don't think it is working for me:( Can anyone see the picture? Happy Gardening All, g Here is a link that might be useful: My New Garden

Before you invest more money for bigger solutions, consider how much time and money you have to actually be handling this. A good lawn is not just a 1-season job of doing something to make it look good. You may have to do something for 2-5 years before you see the result you want. Laying down sod for the entire yard is a fast option but if you aren't taking care of it, you just used a lot of money and will have similar issues again (just like you have described about your previous attempts) A non-grassy solution is that maybe you can turn your entire backyard into a kind of playground or xeriscape area for your kids. Rocks, mulch, pea pebbles, etc -- they will allow for your kids to be able to play in the yard, and for you to be able to spot unwanted plants quickly. Where you do want a particular group of plants, you can do a small bed, either in-ground or in a raised bed. But even at that, it's still something you'll have to maintain throughout the year, because unwanted plants have a way of blowing in through the wind, animals, or even popping up through landscape fabric. If you do have a rototiller already, it's still a good idea to use it to turn the weeds under if you don't want to pull them out first. After that, maintain the area by actively pulling out weeds. You can even make it a game with your kids. Even when I hand-pull weeds, the area I'm working in does get better without high cost of money, but it needs my continuous vigilance to keep it that way.

schoolhouse - great to 'see' you again :-) Spring has been cooler - and drier! - than normal here. We had about half our average April rainfall and May is shaping up to be the same or lower! So weeds have not been too bad here. But about a year ago we had started using garden helpers to work with us for spring and fall clean-up. With the shutdown here re the virus, they were not allowed to operate until this month. So we had to do most of the spring clean-up ourselves. We left the last bit - digging out shrubs in the south alley - until last week when the garden help folk could come to do that - younger, stronger backs were required.... I'm a few years younger than you but 2 hrs. is about my limit too! DH is a bit older than me and healthier - but needs supervision :-) Last year I started the process of simplifying the garden as much as possible in preparation for aging-in-place as long as we can. Hence the digging out of shrubs in the south alley - replaced with 'Biokovo' perennial geraniums to be a groundcover next to the house. We need to remove a redbud tree that has started to fall over - but will wait until after it blooms. By that time hopefully the ash tree will have started to leaf out so we can assess whether to treat it again or just have it taken down. Removing the ash would eliminate a lot of the fall clean-up work! Have you made any changes relating to keeping the garden a viable activity while aging?