G'Day!
For lawn info, i'd start by reading past postings at:
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/lawns/
the lawn care forum.
i noticed you list tractors as a favorite topic. Depending on what land you have besides the lawn, you may want to use a tractor-pulled mower, like we use for our pastures. If so, draw the edges of your garden beds and such to suit the curves your tractor and mower can fit.
If not, with under an acre to cut, and flat at that, you really could do it with a reel mower - the old fasioned mowers you used to be able to hire a local teenager to do the lawn with for $10--. You'll probably end up with a power mower and an edger/weedeater/weedwhip.
If you can, edge your flower beds and such with bricks laid side by side, not end to end; this will provide a wide enough margine you can mow right along and not worry about massacaring the "floppage" (overhanging part of plants.) You may also want to wrap the base of small trees with trunk tape before you accidently scar the bark. A ring of mulch provides a nice mowing-safety margin for trees too, but don't build a "volcano;" mulch should be only 1/2" next to the trunch base, thickening to 1" a foot away and 2" two foot away. Mulch too thick right be the trunck can rot the trunck bark above the root line (trunk and root barks are very different), and shelters wee critters than nibble bark in winter.
'Fraid i know nothing about caring for lawns exept to be sure to get the roots of any weeds. A lot of folk around here disapprove of chemlawn. All that stuff that gets sprayed goes in to the water table, and we who don't live in town pump it back up from our wells. Not so great for folk or our livestock.
A perfect lawn is a very unnatural environment. Sure you don't want ot rip the whole thing up and make it all into garden? To each his own.
You've got a couple month left to plan. Have fun!
-vlad

Here is a link that might be useful: GardenWeb Lawn Care Forum

Hi Bill,

Here's another great source of information for the non-ChemLawn approach. As Vlad says, all of the stuff that gets sprayed goes into the water table, and into the Chesapeake Bay, too, and it doesn't do anybody any good there.

Alfie

Here is a link that might be useful: Non-ChemLawn lawn care FAQ

Hi Bill

You need to first determine your philosophy regarding chemicals and your environment. Read up on it, look at all views. (A high percentage of the lawn chemicals are tracked into the house.) It is very difficult to have a chem-free golf-course lawn. And come back if you need affirmation that a non-perfect lawn is OK.

Never having moved into a house with a nice lawn, I've been content to have a green lawn. Weeds tend to do better than grass when hit with a drought, and don't require special water or fertilizing. One house I was afaid to spray the weed-n-feed because it was all weeds! I have a different philosophy now, and wouldn't consider using that stuff now anyway.

One lawn story: Our neighbors had a chem-free lawn, let it grow to 3-4", always looked dark green, never noticed any weeds and was a bit shaggy. They sold, and the new owners scalped the lawn to 1", applied I-don't-know-what chemicals, and it has looked miserable for years.

I mow our lawn no shorter than 3". I do have to mow more often but it keeps the weeds at bay. Weeds need light to grow and by keeping the grass higher it blocks the light. When I need to fertilize I use Milorganite.

Hi Bill,

Congratulations on your new home! You've gotten some great suggestions so far, but here's more sites on maintaining your lawn without using harsh chemicals.

http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/compost/organic.htm
http://www.theorganicreport.com/pages/160_healthy_grass.cfm?redirect=yes?contentindexID=9&menucontentID=436
http://www.organicgardening.com/feature/0,7518,s1-5-18-142,00.html
http://216.109.89.116/backyardwildlifehabitat/organiclawn.cfm
http://www.members.tripod.com/~Gardeningguru/index-11.html

Newt