Oregon, huh. You are a rarity on this forum. A small garden tractor would really help to pull a large drag all over the yard. The drag is what will do all the leveling for you. What kind of grass do you have? If you have a broad mix of grassy grasses and broadleaf plants (aka, weeds), I'd be inclined to not spray anything first. It could be your weeds form a majority of the plant material. Most of the grasses growing in the PNW are not the type that spread. If you have any of the following, bermuda, Kentucky bluegrass, or bentgrass, then those will spread. Bermuda is usually a warm season grass but you might be close enough to the Pacific and far enough away from the Pacific to keep it happy enough. If you have rye (very popular in the PNW or fescue, then it is not going to spread all by itself. If you seed it now and get a hot summer, all the new grass will be stressed and may die. So there's that consideration. Before you start you will need a drag. A hand pulled drag looks like a 6-foot wide by 4-foot long piece of chain link fence attached to a 6-foot long 2x4. Attach each end of a 12-foot rope to each end of the board. When you drag that thing behind you over the loose sand, the drag will knock off the high points and deposit the loose sand into the low spots. Drag it every which way to get it as level as you can. If you rent a lawn tractor you can make the drag much bigger and go much faster. If you want to do micro leveling, drag a piece of fabric like a rug behind you. Doesn't matter which side is up. Here's how I would go about this. 1. Move all the dog toys away. 2. Fertilize. 3. Water deeply (as you always should). 4. Rent a mower and lower it all the way to the bottom setting. Mow and remow to get it low. Remove all the clippings. 5. Take delivery of several pallets of bagged masonry sand. With bags you can return what you don't use. 6. You and several of your husky friends spread the sand out. 7. Use the drag to level. 8. Water lightly to settle the sand and let it dry a little. New low spots will appear. 9. Repeat steps 6-8. You might need to let the sand dry a little before dragging. 10. Celebrate with beer and pizza for your husky friends. Do NOT release the beer before the job is finished and YOU are walking away from it. They will continue to help you if you hold the beer and pizza as final payment. Water it daily for 2 weeks unless you get rain. It is already fertilized, so water is all it needs. Mow when the grass is tall enough to mow. I'd keep the dog toys off the playing field until you are sure the grass is knitting in. It will be the roots of the grass that hold everything in place. The initial length of grass will be a factor in the amount of sand you need. If the grass was 5 inches high, you'd never be able to level it because the grass would be in the way of the drag. If it is 1/4 inch high, you can level it to a pretty fine degree. 1 cubic yard of sand will add 1/4 inch to 1,000 square feet. If your yard is 5,000 square feet, you'll need 5 cubic yards to raise it 1/4 inch. Moving all that sand around is why you need the husky friends.

Did I miss something....did the writer say she lived in the Frisco area and did the writer also say she has Bermuda grass. If this is so, before you do anything, read material on the different grasses whose mowing height is different. Usually leaving grass higher....3" to 3 1/2" can shade out thatch, clippings can be left on the lawn to act as fertilizer, and what's more important, higher grass shades out weed seeds. Soil in this question is neither here nor there....soil is soil. As far as making the soil want to grow what you put into it, then if you are completely fed up and can entertain the idea of digging it up totally and starting anew, then do that. A good deep digging rototiller is gone over it, then lots of organic matter...peat moss, compost, triple mix, loam, and other organic material....you can find a list of all what that term is on the internet....and this then is incorporated into the soil which then is one that will help hold moisture and enrich what is planted. Sand is often used when aerating to open up the clay so that better drainage is achieved. But it has to be coarse sand....not beach sand, not the sand that is used in play boxes....that stuff just holds water...coarse sand, or builders' sand can be bought at any quarry or soil dealer. How is Bermuda mowed....from what I read, mowing at such a low height as 1" - 1 1/2" is what will surely kill the lawn because it then has no protection from the hot sun. Leave the grass high....3" at least, then it has protection from loss of moisture. Fertilizer and deep watering is what I've seen said about Bermuda. As far as levelling, that can be a matter of digging...actually removing hills, levelling, then return the sod. Rolling such a clay soil lawn is a sure-fire way to add compaction....and increased drainage problems. The only way to level a hilly terrain is to remove the hills and level the ground. But, you could live with it. Hills on lawns are not all that bad if they are not what kids sleigh down in winter.

OK, now the rest of it. >>They really hide all the blemishes, even the big obvious ones where the trees were removed. Shh. That happens in every lawn photo. :-) >>-The 32 lbs of Mag-I-Cal is the total amount I put over the whole lawn. I know it's much stronger than standard calcitic lime. I think (hope) I did my calculations correctly. Good. I once accidentally overapplied 12 pounds per thousand to the gardens and watched the plants turn yellow. Calcitic shouldn't be applied at more than 9 pounds per thousand square feet at a time, with a minimum of 3 months between applications--and repeat only if pH is extraordinarily low. -I'll revise my Milorganite schedule to cut out the June and July feedings. I'm not sure about feed stores nearby, I'll have You certainly can if you wish, or not if you wish. While I tend to recommend against summer applications on healthy lawns, it's not exactly going to be a problem. Quite the opposite, and if you notice color fading badly in the summer sun, feed it. It might need the free iron. >>application. So basically for the same price I'd get more bang for my buck out of the soybean meal? I know dchall That does depend. The bag rate for Milorganite is 14.4 pounds per thousand. I generally recommend 20 to target 1 pound of available nitrogen per application (organic N does take a while to work in, so far less than that is initially available). For soybean meal, 1 pound of N per K is 15 pounds of soybean per thousand. So you're using three quarters the amount to do the same feeding job. If raising OM is your goal, neither soy nor Milorganite is technically your best choice. Cracked corn requires 60 pounds per thousand to supply the same 1 pound of N per K. Which means it's less likely to smell terrible at very high levels of application (decay scent is nitrogen compounds--less nitrogen, less smell, as a general rule and all else being equal). >>uses Alfalfa pellets, is there a reason you prefer soybean meal over alfalfa? Is Alfalfa more expensive in our region? For me, it's pricey. To get that 1 pound of N equivalent, alfalfa needs to go down at 50 pounds per thousand, more than three times the rate of soybean meal. Since it's about the same price, the nitrogen is three times as expensive. Northern lawns don't benefit--and actually can suffer delays--from too much alfalfa put down at once. 20 pounds per thousand per month is the maximum rate the guru I learned from recommended. >>-I definitely understand what you're saying about just spot spraying weeds. Seeing the amount of crabgrass that is popping up this year, though, By all means area spray if the problem is widespread in the area. Spot spraying is great, but sometimes clearing the deck initially is required. >>I think I still want to use a preemergent in the spring. I've spent several hours the past couple weeks pulling crabgrass and it's continuing to pop up faster than I can pull it. Pre-emergents are wonderful. I spray Prodiamine once a year for a 9 month shield. It's not perfect, but I'm also not complaining about 90% effective. I haven't pulled a weed from the stone patio in years. I don't have to. >>I expect improvement as my yard thickens, but one of my neighbors yard is 100% weeds, so I may always have a bit of a battle on my hands. You've seen my lawn? The lawns to the southwest, south, east, northeast, and north are weed pits. No worries, your lawn can outcompete any weed. With the possible exception of some of the Poa genus. >>-I've considered edging my driveway with some landscaping, but like the idea of the grass going right up to the edge of it, mainly to keep the mowing as simple as possible as ridiculous as that is. No problem! We all have our aesthetic preferences. >>Like dchall said I'll stick some tuna cans there the next time I water and see what's happening. I'll give it one more season and if I can't keep control of it maybe I'll throw in some landscaping. At the very least maybe an 8" border of light colored pavers will be enough of a buffer. Good plan. Keep in mind that areas bordering pavement may require watering more often. When I designed my irrigation system, I did it so that the south face of the driveway was zoned with other things that need more. Now if I'd remembered to do that on the north side...but no matter. I'll eventually turn that into another 20 square feet of garden attached to the gardens on either side of it. >>-I'll have to sneak out and chop off some of that pine tree. If the branches are over onto your property you have every legal right to cut them off at the property line. It might be impolitic to do so, however, so I fully support your decision to wear black and do this at 2 AM. Storm damage sometimes comes up so suddenly and takes off just a few branches, huh. >>The grass isn't totally barren, it looks fine from a distance, so I'm not at the point of giving up and mulching it yet. Also try feeding and watering it a bit more than the other areas of the lawn. Sometimes hard-pressed grass just needs a hand up. -I was afraid of that answer about the chipmunks. I do enjoy seeing them out there but they need to leave my plants alone! I'll try the Tabasco sauce, maybe line the base of the plants with chicken wire, stick a hose down their holes and the spread the cat litter. If they still persist, I think I may resort to the rat zapper. Looking it up, at least one site states that there are no repellents registered for chipmunks. However, it also says that any squirrel repellent will work on them. Sonic repellent device(s) might be another idea. -When I said "possibly with a slit seeder" that was my weak way of asking if that's a recommended method. I've never used one and I'm a little worried it's going to do some damage. Will I see much better results with that vs just using a broadcast spreader after aerating? You'll get great results with a slit seeder. I got great results broadcast spreading seed on the soil (no aeration, no raking, no preparation at all). Assuming this is in blank areas, topdressing with 1/8" of peat moss to hold some moisture might be a good idea. For general lawn transmission, that's unnecessary, expensive, and time consuming.

Note that "screened topsoil" and most places that sell either bulk or bagged topsoil, are not really selling topsoil at all but rather some engineered soil mix/soil amendment that is likely to be more bark or compost than than actual soil. You can find numerous discussions about this on the Soils forum. Ideally, using your own garden soil is probably as good as you can get. Is there somewhere in your garden you could extract the amount of soil you need to level? Or maybe from a neighbor? The indigenous soil is the best option but if you do have to purchase soil, be sure to examine it to make sure it is as close to your garden soil as possible.