Now We Get to Play in the Dirt.

So now the pipes are laid and the trenches are covered up. The next step is to fill in all the sink holes. So far I have spent around $200 for the pipes, and we did the labor ourselves. Next I had to call and order some dirt...nothing fancy, just plain old dirt. The sandman delivers all kinds of dirt...but not when it's raining. Luckily, my parents came down to help us with the yard, but the first several days of their visit were very wet and rainy so nothing much got finished. Finally the sun came out and dried the dirt enough to be hauled to our front door. Yes...the front, not the back, which is where we needed it. $270 worth of fill dirt was literally dumped in the front yard. Mom and Dad thought they could use a wheelbarrow to carry it around to the back yard. After about 3 trips they decided to go rent a tractor....
I think my dad had a lot of fun with the tractor. He finished taking the dirt to the back yard and filled in all the sink holes but kept riding it around for a few hours after that, continually finding something else to pack down or level out. But, thank God he did, because we would have never filled all the holes back there!!
Once the dirt was transferred and packed down, we leveled it out with rakes and threw a butt load of grass seeds everywhere. Then we laid down some Curlex anti-erosion blankets. I had to order the blankets from a landscaping supply company in Arlington, Tennessee. Mom, Dad and Betty went out there to pick them up in Betty's truck, because they were 8 feet long and wouldn't fit in my Murano. Three Curlex blankets and yard staples cost $200, and we rolled, cut and stapled it ourselves. I was really sore after that!!
Now we just have to water the heck out of it everyday until the grass starts growing through the blanket, and pray to God that this works!