I feel your pain! I use a moon-shaped edging tool (not powered). I always do each bed in the spring, and I often repeat mid-summer. It's a pretty big job, but I've gotten used to it and don't mind it too much anymore. I think of it as good, free exercise. But if it bothers you, it might be worth outsourcing. There are certainly more enjoyable gardening tasks you can spend your time on!

I've put down the rubber etching from lowes/home depot and mulched the beds heavily

I have a small lawn in the back. It is in part sun and has a shrub border along two sides, one side is bordered by a mulched vegetable gar*den area and the other is a sitting area that has a brick edge to it. The grass over runs the bricks and has to be worked on about every two years. Sometimes I can get another year out of it if I don't mind the messiness. The vegetable area with mulch has landscape fabric under the mulch and so far that has cut down on the amount of work keeping the grass out of there. On the two sides that have shrub borders, we use the 'moon edger' that was mentioned above. The beds are mulched and I tried the V edge, but found that when I had 'helpers' applying mulch the next year, they filled in the V section and defeated the whole purpose of it. [g] I also have enough shade there, that moss is growing along the front of the border and the grass seems to stop there. I am encouraging the moss. I don't mind too much having to keep up with those shrub bed edges. They aren't that huge and I don't have to do it too often. I suppose my grass doesn't grow too fast, since I have more shade than sun on that side. Actually, I don't really mind doing it either. I find it therapeutic. But then again, I like va*cuuming too. [g]

I have seen someone who adds brick edging to every bed and seems to be happy with it. If you look for posts by 'woodyoak' you will find she has posted about her edging with pho*tos lots of times. I link to one such post below. She talks about her edging almost at the end of the thread.

Here is a link that might be useful: Paths in your garden - Woodyoak

IF you go with brick edging next to lawn, don't just use single layer, laid flat - that will drive you nuts. The photo in the thread PM pointed to looks like that, but, as woodyoak said in her post, she used "4"x8" paver bricks, set on compacted limestone screenings, with metal edging between the brick and grass".

If you don't use metal between the bricks and the lawn - and I don't, because I like to be able to adjust my borders on a whim - at a minimum, use one row laid on edge, parallel to the lawn edge (-----), with a "soldier row" of bricks laid flat, (::::::) next to them, on the "garden side" of the edge.

The outer row will be a little deeper and will discourage grass from overrunning the inner row. If possible, add a steel edge on the lawn side - these are hard to find even at landscape supply places but I know they're available because the pros all use them.

I have brick edging on almost all my borders - a few left to do that currently have landscape timbers (left over from another project, and practically worthless as edging). I have to edge my brick at least once a year - it's MUCH easier to do it twice than to deal with big sod clumps annually. It's not that hard, and can sometimes be assigned to helpers since it doesn't require any knowledge of what's a weed and what's a prized plant.

Most of my beds have no edging and I use the hand U shaped edging tool, actually lucky for me Joe does but I did try the edging tool on my Mantis tiller many years ago and all I recall is it was a disaster.

When I have chores that I really despise I try to add some kind of reward to the task, perhaps listening to an audio book or music while you are edging, sharing a photo with us of the finished job might be satisfying, or treating you self to a special plant when the task is done might make it a little easier .
Dtd . Why do you edge your brick?

Hi Runktrun - I tidy up the edge of the brick because it looks really nice when it's got a clean edge between the brick and the grass, and because the grass eventually does get past the edge otherwise. On the garden side of the bricks, I usually have spillers like nepeta or thyme, so I don't end up with TOO clean a look. In fact the overall layout is sort of formal (straight lines everywhere) and the layout within the beds is entirely informal, so the edge marks the beginning of "contained chaos", in a way.

You lucky duck, a live-in edger; personally, I can't let my DH edge anything. The last time I tried it, when I looked the other way he had the bright idea to use the flame thrower to kill the grass along the edge of the pool patio. We had a lovely display of dead grass for about a month afterward. Never again, I'd rather deal with the errant grass myself, or ignore it.

prairiemoon, thank you so much for that link. Oh, the paths! The gardens! And that curv-rite edging looks like something my husband would run right out and buy tonight if he could. He absolutely HATES trying to mow with the trench edging we have. I'd say it will cost us a very pretty penny, though, to get metal edging for all the edging we have. Worth it, though!

I was out doing more edging this afternoon when my 11-y.o. son came out to see what I was up to. I showed him how I jump on my moon-shaped edger with both feet and he wanted to try. I'd say I got about 2 yards out of him before he was bored with it. Good idea to get a book on tape or something to listen to when I'm pogo-sticking my way around the edges, LOL!

DtD, that is what I did around my sitting area, the single layer of brick. I can't even see the brick right now and I'm ignoring it until the lawn creeps over it. [g] I know the way Woody did it has to work great, but the thought of doing all that work keeps me happier with my moon edger. You gave me a good laugh about your husband with the flame thrower...lol. Oh my. My dh has done some funny stuff like that in the gar*den too, but gee, it's been awhile since he's done anything remotely like that. I'll have to tell him what a great job he's been doing.

Alice, you must have Freecycle where you are. Maybe you could post that you were looking for the metal edging or the pavers every once in awhile and find some that way. If you keep checking the Freecycle website, you'd be surprised what you see.