Goodbye Driveway

So a couple weeks months ago we started working on tearing out the random patch of old driveway located in our front yard.




First we rented a demo hammer from Lowe's and ripped up as much of the concrete as I could before having to return the thing (only rented it for 4 hours). There was still some large pieces of concrete remaining but I was able to dig out about 3-4 inches throughout. Then we had the topsoil delivered...

And then it sat there. For like weeks. Yup we're probably big hits with the neighbors right about now. We would chip away a wheelbarrow here a wheelbarrow there taking it to other areas of the yard, but with the amount of rain we had in April and May it dragged on waaaay too long. But finally we reached the point where everything was leveled with the existing soil. We took the extra time to slope the patch just slightly to allow for drainage and broke up any large chunks using a shovel and rake.

We originally thought we would have sod delivered and take an easy approach to this ordeal. However we were a little skeptical if sod would survive being laid on only a few inches of topsoil with bits of concrete still remaining underneath the topsoil. With a little googling here and here we found out that seeding (especially with fescue type seeds) might be our best bet. We came across Scott's Patchmaster Sun and Shade which was a combination of grass seed (mostly fescues), fertilizer and mulch.

We bought the 15 lbs. bag from Lowe's for around $19 on sale. After applying the entire bag to our topsoiled patch it looked like this:

We watered once a day for about 30-45 minutes on the days that it didn't rain and 8 days later we're lookin' like this!

Although we're definitely not out of the woods yet, we're very relived to see some progress and some green! Lucky for us and our water bill, we're supposed to see rain everyday this week so we'll be keeping a close eye on it...and of course keep you posted.

So have you had any luck growing grass in or on some interesting areas? Or have any horror stories about grass seeding or sod? We'd love to hear it!