Where are you located? What kind of grass do you have? Pictures would help.

I am in Maryland..

Its a new construction house so Im not sure what the builder used. For the past 2 years i have overseeded with Scotts Tall Fescue.

here are some pics

I'd kill and re-do. There's some grass there but a lot of it is weeds.

You should start now. Glyphosate everything and water 30 minutes daily for a week or two until more weeds germinate. Glyphosate again. Water 30 minutes daily for another week or two to sprout more weeds. Glyphosate again. That should put you in a good spot to seed early September.

Call The Hogan Company and have them recommend a good fescue mix for your area. Stay away from bog box store mixes.

Can you water the seed? If you don't have irrigation, you need to figure out how much area you can water lightly several times a day with hoses and sprinklers and a timer. I would not attempt a renovation without having a workable watering plan. You might do a renovation on part and an overseeding on part (and hope for frequent, light rains). If you just overseed, you should use a selective weed killer soon (something that kills crabgrass in addition to broadleafs), as most say don't seed for so and so many weeks. In your other thread you said you were getting a soil test. If you need lime, put that down in conjunction with aeration so the lime can get further down the holes. Do the compost then too. The lime should be done several weeks ahead of seeding, so that's another do as soon as possible thing, IF you need lime. You should look into using Tenacity at seeding or the Scott's starter fertilizer with mesotrione. Aim for early to mid September for seeding.

Finely manicured lawns are traditional in most gardens, but science shows that they’re very detrimental to the natural environment. For that reason and many others, my wife Suzanne and I have removed the extensive but boring lawn that came with the property when we bought our house in Naples, Florida (Zone 10b). We replaced the half-acre lawn with several beds of native Florida flowering shrubs, blooming ground covers, bromeliads, wildflowers, grasses and other plants which benefit wildlife, while simultaneously beautifying the garden. As a result, we save a lot of work and the great expense of repeatedly watering our property. The only times we use the hose now is when we have an extensive period of drought.

Like many Floridians, we live in a private community with a Home Owner’s Association. Almost all HOAs have strict rules about what you can and can’t plant in your own home’s garden. Most of them specify how carefully you must maintain your large and well-mowed lawn. That’s why we chose to buy a home in a community without rigid rules, so we’re free to landscape our property to make it look as Mother Nature intended. Although most of our neighbors still keep their standard lawns, our garden looks so strikingly attractive by comparison that several neighbors have set sections aside to create colorful wildflower beds like ours.

Most lawns require artificial fertilizers, chemical pesticides, weed-killing poisons and other dangerous chemicals that sooner or later permeate the soil and seep into streams and lakes. This man-made damage could kill the area’s native plants, butterflies and other beneficial insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and small mammals. Home owners who hire commercial lawn services to regularly mow the lawn and spray or soak these chemicals into their gardens are spending their money to cause all the deaths. Gardeners who do the work themselves are just as responsible. Converting lawns to flower beds, wildflowers or other plantings would save the home owner lots of money or time and labor.

That’s one of the subjects taught in the free gardening classes scheduled by our large and growing Gardeners of Southwest Florida group. Over 1,300 families with gardens around Naples and Fort Myers are current members of the group, and more are always welcome. Everything in the group is free: instant membership, gardening classes, light snacks, soft drinks, etc. Two-hour classes are scheduled on weekends two or three times a month throughout the year, often taught by professional horticulturists. They take place in the gardens of a different group member each time, so that members and their guests can learn about each host’s favorite plants and gardening techniques. Hundreds of photos and full details of the previous 123 classes and upcoming classes are on the group’s extensive and informative website at www.meetup.com/FloridaGardeners. Gardeners who join can meet friendly local members like the ones who attended a recent class in our garden’s screened enclosure:

At right, Peter Kacalanos and Suzanne Cherney, group leaders, Gardeners of Southwest Florida

petersuzanne-

While you have a very beautiful garden, I'm not sure what your post has to do with the question at hand.

The original poster wants to fix her lawn in Maryland, not plant a garden in Florida.

Our comment was to suggest that the original poster might consider not replacing the grass after she kills it, Joe, to avoid the continuing effort and expense gardeners have with traditional lawns. If Amanda is determined to keep a lawn, we apologize for suggesting an alternative solution to the problem. Sorry 'bout that.