Semi Organic Lawn Maintenance

Our new place in Richmond has a yard since it's a real house (that we rent part of).  Real houses have real yards that real adults have to mow.  Woah responsibilities.  Since our landlord didn't seem to be planning on having maintenance do yard work we decided to offer to do it ourselves; and she agreed.  She paid for a few simple tools so we could handle it ourselves.  

We are now in charge of keeping the yard in check.  First item we bought - a lawn mower.  Not just any regular lawn mower but a back to basics eco friendly push mower.  Yep, no gas guzzling nasty fumey contraption here, just clean easy exercise with the Task Force 16" Reel Push Mower.  Seen here.  

before grass shot

Here Tony is setting it up which involved a few basic screws to get the handle bars in place.  Very simple just a few minutes (and few glances at the manual) and we were in business.  It practically comes ready out of the box!  Again there is no gas to buy and fill or things to charge, so buy this on a sunny afternoon when your grass is ready to be mowed.

after grass shot

Its pretty small as lawnmowers go so you need very little room to store it.  It's also very light and even I can maneuver it easily and even pick it up to store it.  It's not your regular bulky, heavy, needs quarter of a garage to store type of mower.  The handle bar flips forward for compact storage.  Perfect for us.  

Here is a video we took of it in action.  The website and reviewers say it works best of flat, small lawns.  Check and check.  You can see how not great our lawn is though - part gravel, patchy, part non grass; still works great.  

Overall we love this lawnmower!  It was cheap, it's very easy to use, it actually works and is eco friendly.  It is also a little bit of a workout when you use it so win win (win).  I highly recommend one!

We also picked up a basic battery powered weed-whacker to get those tight spots.  Since we live on a semi big street lots of people drive and walk by so we want our front yard especially to look clean and clipped.  We're still working with the existing landscaping.  There are some bushes that I have no clue what to do with and tons of weeds.  I straight pulled lots of the overgrown vine-y weeds early on but I'm gonna do some research on DIY making some eco friendly homemade weeds killers for the little ones that keep coming back.  Wish me luck.

Task Force (and Lowes) did not sponsor this post or anything to do with it.  The opinions are all mine and not influenced by anyone.  They don't even know my blog exists or that I am writing this.