Lawn love.

There are purists and naturalists and horticulturists who turn their noses at the existence of artificial grass. And there are home owners who believe that it melts and gets hot and choose to put in new sod lawns in their yards no matter what. And then there is the drought in California.

And then there is us.

Two years ago we installed a brand new sprinkler system and beautiful green grass. And when it was good, it was good. We bought a lawnmower and a weed wacker for the edges and only slightly cringed when we saw the increase in our water bill. I mean, we had a flat patch of grass in our before non-user friendly back yard.

But the upkeep and maintenance became tedious. Much of the mowing had to be done by hand because of the weird shape and curves. The surrounding rocks and walls were getting more water than some of the areas of the lawn because of the weird shape and inability to contort sprinkler heads in the way we needed them to be. And what started as one brown patch, turned into more and more. And then it stopped raining all together. And then construction started. So we slowly let the patch of dirt return.

Until last week.

The hefty extra "difficult to access" fee that all 3 proposals I received included made the already expensive choice for artificial grass even more ludicrous, so we took it upon ourselves to do the prep work. It took all of last week for my determined and ever cheerful band of helpers to dig up 4" of dirt and fill two 5-yard dumpsters, add some pavers to the flagstone patio, and then carry up 5 yards of recycled base rock and 1 yard of decomposed granite in 5 gallon buckets. I carried 4 buckets in an effort to show solidarity. I decided providing a cooler of cold drinks and lunch was a better way to show my support and gratitude.

On Saturday morning, at 7:30AM a team of 5 installers rolled up in a huge white truck and got straight to work.

Installers spreading out decomposed granite layer.

Measuring the green carpet in our rental house driveway.

Installing the green carpet.

Finished!

And all of this for approximately 600 square feet of green. That we absolutely love.

And all of this for a 600 sq foot patch of green. That we absolutely love.

Ps. If you are interested in what we learned, why we choose artificial grass, who we used and why we chose them, feel free to contact me!