A landscaper and a contractor usually like to finish projects so they can be enjoyed and seen by others. But a resident might want to take more time to figure out, for example, the exact number of square feet of the kitchen garden. So one's yard becomes a work in progress: a dynamic landscape but not finished. My experience with my own yard is, one wants more kitchen garden space than one estimates at first. You could save some money by getting ideas from walks and drives in your area, looking over the fences of others' gardens; and also by doing some of the work yourselves. For example, you could have loam and manure trucked in, but spread it yourselves. You could have your fences put in, but do your own new-garden rototilling. You could certainly plant much of your own new plant material except for large shrubs and trees. And do you have to present a large lawn to your neighbors? (maybe there's a HOA rule about this.) There are better eco-ways to cover your acres, that would use less water and look more interesting, and -- who knows? -- be edible too. So my general advice is to take your time, don't do it all at once, and do some of it yourself. Carol

>How big of an area are you talking about?Rather small, actually. It's a small strip alongside the driveway, measuring something like 5' x 10'. >I'm going to go back to TW's first post and suggest that your friend should learn to love Bermuda.I suppose he could learn to love dandelions, oxalis and crabgrass as well, but that's really not an ideal suggestion for my fescue lawn or garden beds growing alongside it. I can't understand anyone who *chooses* to grow Bermuda grass. It's invasive to every other part of your landscape, ugly (compared to fescue anyway) and turns a lovely shade of brownish gray in the winter. :( Solarization sounds like the most effective choice, but lord, having a dead lawn next door for the next year hardly has me dancing for joy. But I appreciate the suggestions.

Here's the standard methodology: 1. Demolition (for gardens, removing all unwanted plants/trees 2. Any hardscape (walkways, walls, fences, raised beds, structures) 3. Irrigation and lighting 4. plant trees and large shrubs 5. smaller plants go in next 6. sod is always, always last. so I would re-order your projects as follows: 9. Remove old juniper and liquid amber New wire trellis on brick fence wall for espaliered fruit trees and flowering vines like clematis Garden shed 4. Vegetable bed (14x14) prepare the soil, add in manure and compost, make paths 5. Fencing for vegetable bed 1. Completely new irrigation for main areas (lawn, veg bed, flower beds) 2. New irrigation for additional areas which are currently not landscaped or have no irrigation (hand watered currently). I was thinking to provision a irrigation tapping point) Landscape lighting (my landscsape guy prefers low voltage over solar) main area (paths, a couple of main plantings) Plant new gingko in the same spot as liquid amber being removed 6. Plant fruit trees 7. Plant berry & fruit vines (kiwi, grape, raspberry, blackberry, currants) 8. Two new beds for perennials (flowering, foliage and some edible perennials) Decomposed granite in the sidewalk area (this is currently dirt and gets muddy in rain and is very dusty in summer) Decomposed granite under some redwood trees. This is just a big mess of leaf droppings here and I want to be able to use the area for kids to play and be able to sweep the leaf droppings away 3. New sod A couple of things, #12, are you expecting DG to act as a sidewalk? DG in rainy conditions is not walkable and will be a mess. It also washes away pretty badly. DG is best in dry spots. Use pavers or flagstones instead for a walkway. And anything under redwood trees is kind of iffy. Keep in mind you are going to be fighting a living thing that can live 2,000 years and get 100 feet tall. Another thing, you are making a lot of ambitious changes, make sure you can maintain what you plan to have. Berries can turn into the bramble around Sleeping Beauty's castle if you don't keep up maintenance on them, for example. Good luck with your projects!

"Eliminating it involves getting th soil into a condition that will grow a good stand of grass which includes adjusting the soil pH." Adjusting soil pH will have little to no impact on the horsetails and eliminating them entirely will require a much greater effort. These plants have been around for over 300 million years and are circumpolar in distribution - they occur everywhere!! They are not fussy about soil conditions and will grow in moist as well as consistently dry soils, acidic to alkaline (their preference is neutral to slightly basic but they will grow in acidic soils as well) and from clay to sandy soils. Their silica content makes them difficult to control with most herbicides and control and eventual elimination requires considerable diligence on the part of the homeowner. It is a process measured in years typically, not weeks.