It appears that you want to overseed. You can literally find hundreds of pages on overseeding if you type the term into Google. You can also find a ton of conversations on this forum if you just search back a bit. In fact, there has been a lot of talk about it as of late.

Here is my take, but take it for what it is worth since I am by far not one of the resident gurus around here. However, since I have been reading the board and other sites religiously for the past year, while nursing my own lawn back to respectability, I have a somewhat good handle on it.

- I have a feeling that most people would recommend starting from scratch. Here is why...If you are going to overseed, you need to start by killing the weeds. Judging from the pictures, you probably won't have much left anyway after that. It doesn't really look like your lawn is salvageable.
- If you do decide to salvage it, one problem you will have is matching up the grass type. Since it is old and pre-dates you living there, odds are you will have to guess.
- Once you see some of the photos of other people's lawns on this forum, my guess is that you will be itching to start anew with some premium seed.
- Lastly, if you are going to nurse this one back to health, my guess is that you will end up spending more money on weed killing chemicals and spreading MORE of them (more harmful for your family) than if you just killed the whole thing and started from scratch. A thick, new lawn requires much fewer chemicals than a patchy lawn that is in the process of being nursed back to health.

Of course, you can always try my route and nurse it back to health. I have been doing that for the last year. I have had my battles with grubs, weeds, bare patches and mismatched seed...but I am winning the battle. The best part is that I am slowly moving towards going organic.....Judging from the look of your lawn, if you really want to avoid a total renovation, it is going to take a few years, with the fall months devoted to overseeding and overseeding again, and with the spring months dedicated to applying preemergent and weed control.

My best guess:
- It will take you 1 year to have an awesome lawn if you start from scratch in the fall.
- It will take you 3 years if you try to work with what you have.

I'd go for the start from scratch. From the looks, you're going to have a lot of seeding weeds trying to compete with your seeding.

Maybe you don't have to do it everywhere, just in the worst patches? If the best areas are grass, skip those and overseed instead. Should you decide to go with another grass, like the Magnificent 3, then it's definitely time to kill the whole thing.

You'll still fight weeds until the new grass establishes, but after that you're pretty much home free.

Wow.

Looking at those pictures caused me to break out in hives.

I'd round it all up and start over. I've read that once your lawn reaches more than 30-40 percent weed, you are actually better off killing it and starting over.

From the pictures, it looks like you have mostly weeds with the occasional sprig of grass. If that is the case, you really are better off killing it all and reseeding. It is harder than you think to get grass growing in a weed patch. If the seed isn't touching soil or is overshadowed by weeds, it is unlikely to grow.

If you don't want to do that (even though you should)the next best choice would be to cut everything low and then aerate the heck out of it. Make 3 or 4 passed across each other before seeding. That will tear up the soil enough for the seeds to get down in there.

In your area, you want to stick with a cool season grass, obviously. The most popular choice would be KBG, but you could also do a mix of KBG/Rye/Fine Fescue. Since you have a couple of big trees there, you might want to go with a mix to cope with the shade.

Hello,

If I was to cut low and aerate, which method? Plug or spike? Tow behind plug, or rent a beast from the big box boys?

I think I have a slight chance of re-seeding as after I dethatched I pulled most of the weeds out, leaving grasses and some moss. The soil its moist and dark everywhere. I can penetrated it with a stick up to 2 inches. Lots of sun till 2-3pm when a light filtered shade comes in to cool the lot.

Again, I'm not looking for an award winner here, just something better than what I got.

Thanks

If I was to cut low and aerate, which method? Plug or spike?

Plug. It pulls soil up which can then settle over your seed as you water it. Spike just compacts the soil.

The soil its moist and dark everywhere.

Regrettably, it's also probably filled with weed seeds. Seeding with Tupersan (if you're using a compatible grass) would be wise to stop the weeds.

Lots of sun till 2-3pm when a light filtered shade comes in to cool the lot.

It doesn't get much better than that. You can confidently choose any grass and it will do well in greater than six hours of sun a day.

Again, I'm not looking for an award winner here, just something better than what I got.

Since you're not a lawn psycho like I am (and most of us here are), you can choose an off-the-shelf brand of grass seed and I'm sure you'll be perfectly happy with it. Most of us write big name brand seed off as "crud," but millions of people have fairly nice lawns using it and are perfectly content with it.