Ok, wow. I mean WOW! You're getting the wrong advice on every front. St Aug would THRIVE in that shade. The grass died because they didn't water it. Actually it might have died the first time from a disease left to run out of control, but in any case, the solution now is new sod (NOT SEED) and water. That cheap builder grade bermuda is only one notch below the very best bermuda grass you can buy at any price. The reason it is cheap and "builder grade" is that it is easy to grow and every grower in Texas grows it. The supply of that stuff is inexhaustible, but you cannot get a better turf grass without paying through the nose. The name of it is TIF 419 or TifTurf, or something like that. It has been around for 40 years or more and is very popular. The more expensive TIF varieties are only used in professional sports stadiums. I should note that ALL seeded varieties of bermuda are basically common bermuda, not the TIF hybrid. Thus if you start with a TIF lawn, you should never reseed bermuda into it. The common bermuda looks like a weed in a hybrid turf. Here is a picture of common bermuda invading a TIF turf. Note the common is bluer in color, coarser, and has a different growth habit. It's a mess once you have them mingled. If you have already seeded with common bermuda, I would not attempt to install a hybrid (sod) lawn without a lot of prep to kill the common. June is the time to take on that project. Whatever you do, do not fall into the trap of watching all the golf TV where they are urging you to get out and do something to the lawn. Bermuda needs hot soil to do much of anything to it. The reason your neighborhood lawns might look cheap is because they don't know how to care for them. Bermuda needs a LOT of maintenance to keep it nice. It should be mowed to about 1 inch high, 2x per week and 3x per week during the spring flush of new growth. It also needs heavy fertilizer applied monthly all season long. Most people are unwilling to do what it takes to make bermuda look great. Having said all that, I still prefer a St Aug lawn if you can keep it watered. All lawns need exactly the same amount of water to keep them looking nice through the summer. That amount is one inch per week, applied all at one time. The problem with St Aug is if you fail to water it for 3-5 weeks, it can die on you. Other grasses will go dormant first, but St Aug just dies. That's what happened in your yard. Bermuda would never grow in your shade, but St Aug should do fine. In fact, St Aug will take over your yard even if you have bermuda now. You would have to keep the St Aug mowed at the mower's highest setting and allow it to invade the bermuda. Bermuda cannot invade into tall St Aug because the tall St Aug provides too much shade for bermuda. But if you mow the grass at the lowest setting, then the bermuda can invade just fine and will give you a mess. Absolutely DO NOT rototill the soil in prep for a lawn. You might want to rototill for a vegie garden but never for a lawn. The tilled soil will take 3 years to settle, and it will settle unevenly. There is hardly anything worse than mowing a bumpy lawn.

See there. Learn something everyday. This proprietary jargon is getting ahead of me. Good deal. You are getting one fine system that should give you years of good service as well as comfort and savings compared to that oversized system you have now. A little knowledge goes a long way. IMO Here is a link that might be useful: Evolution Connex Controller

My dad swears by the book, "Lawn Care for Dummies." You might want to get a copy of that or some similar book. My caveat would be, and I'm not 100% sure, but it is my educated guess, that the tree in your front yard is a Norway maple. They are notorious for excluding and impeding the growth of anything in their vicinity. Their roots are so aggressive that they suck away all the nutrients and water so that anything that tries to grow under them just can't compete. Add more water and nutrients or soil under them and they will just suck away more! Plus the dense shade will limit your choice of plants for by your foundation. Edited to add that it could be a silver maple, but again, can't tell from the photo. Many of the caveats still apply for that tree as well, notoriously "rooty." Still lots of options but chose ones that can tolerate shade. Your two choices are just accept a sparse lawn (it could probably get somewhat better but with that Norway maple it will never be lush) or cut down the tree. But first show a photo of the tree's leaves and close up of the trunk and branches to confirm my suspicions. If it were me, I'd do the best I could, not try to have the perfect lawn around that tree, put edging on the beds around the perimeter like you mentioned, and add some good black dirt and replant with some nicer things in those areas. Bear in mind that shade tolerance is a must for your yard. You could mulch or put a little patio or gazebo out there somewhere if you wanted a play area with less stuff on the ground for bugs to hide in. But outside = bugs pretty much. Do not mulch under your tree. It won't do any good. The trees will just send out more roots to grow on top of the mulch. Most trees can do with an inch or two of mulch but no more. Those volcanoes of mulch under trees just kill them slowly by suffocation. In fact, keep mulch away from the trunks of trees. In the case of Norway maple, just try and overmulch them, they will just respond with, "Bring It!" There are many schools of thought on seeding a lawn. If you have more money than time, I just used to shoot out seed with my spreader before I knew there was going to be a big rain event. Some grass sprouted. Over time, it filled in. My strategy was a "survival of the fittest" strategy but it worked as well as any other strategy and was a whole lot less work than all the patching and watering I did before. Sometimes I would just sprinkle seed on bare areas. I use occasional weed killer applications and hand weeding to keep down the weeds. That's how I got my lawn into shape, a combination of weeding and reseeding over time. You'll need to do both. Grass seed has certain temperature conditions for seeding so check the package and don't seed until you're well into that zone. But then grass stops growing when it gets too hot also, so seed in spring and fall. Your biggest challenge is going to be the tree, so like I said, lower your expectations.

Old English Scratch Cover is pretty good stuff. Works great if the wood you're polishing is reasonably close to one of the two shades (light and dark) they offer. Been using it for close to 5 decades now. More recently I discovered Howard Restore-A-Finish, which comes in NINE wood shades. I like it even better. The RAF can is twice the size of the Old English bottle, but less than double the price at the hardware store up the road from here. So I guess it's a better deal. However, one bottle of Old English usually lasts me 10-15 years, so I'm not sure that matters much.