I have a love/hate relationship with yardwork.

When we first bought this house back in 1991, we had one of the prettiest yards on the block. The house was brand new—no one had ever lived in it—and the front yard had fresh Bermuda sod. I did my best to keep it looking good. Back then, I actually enjoyed working in the yard.

Then life happened.

After my son was born, I found it increasingly difficult to keep the yard maintained the way it needed to be. Between work, family, and everything else that comes with having kids, the yard slowly moved down the priority list.

So, I hired a lawn care company to come out every other month and spray the yard.

We used that company for several years. During that time, they went through a few changes. They changed their name a couple of times, and unfortunately, the service seemed to change right along with the name.

After about the third name change, I started noticing a strange weed growing right in the middle of my front yard.

Every time they came out, I would point it out.

“Can you do something about that?”

Every time, I got essentially the same response.

“We’ll take care of it.”

Well…

They never did.

After about a year of watching this weed continue to grow while the lawn care company continued to promise they would “take care of it,” I finally gave them the boot.

Unfortunately, by then, that little patch of weeds had tripled in size.

A couple of years ago, I finally realized something rather disturbing.

I didn’t have a lawn anymore.

I had a weed yard.

Apparently, the weed had won.

I finally took a picture of it, Googled it, and discovered exactly what kind of weed I was dealing with and, more importantly, how to get rid of it. I found the chemical I needed on Amazon and ordered a bottle.

Last year, I started my campaign to reclaim my yard.

I sprayed.

And sprayed.

And sprayed some more.

I managed to make a pretty good dent in the weed population, but it still had a firm grip on a large portion of my front yard.

This year, I was determined to finish the job.

After several more treatments, I finally managed to put the weeds to rest.

I thought I had finally reached step two in restoring my lawn.

Then I discovered my next enemy.

Moss.

Apparently, the weeds had called in reinforcements.

I had moss growing underneath one of my trees, so once again, I turned to Google. I found out how to get rid of it, treated it a couple of times, and eventually managed to eliminate the moss.

Victory!

Except there was one small problem.

After killing off the weeds and the moss, I was left with several large, dark patches of bare ground in my front yard.

At this point, I was beginning to wonder if I was actually improving the yard or just finding new ways to destroy it.

Fortunately, I have a daughter who is dating the owner of a landscaping company. I talked to him about the proper way to get grass growing in those bare spots.

His solution?

Topsoil.

Simple enough.

So last week, I went to the hardware store and bought four bags of topsoil. Each bag contained one cubic foot.

I knew four bags weren’t going to be enough, but I figured it would at least make a dent.

I was wrong.

Not even close.

A few days later, I went back to the hardware store to get at least six more bags.

They only had four.

So I bought four.

Again, not even close.

By Saturday, I decided I needed to get serious.

I loaded up my trailer and, after Bible study, headed back to the hardware store. This time, I bought twelve bags.

As I was loading them, I remember thinking, “What am I going to do with all this leftover topsoil?”

Apparently, I had nothing to worry about.

After putting down six bags, I realized I was going to need a whole lot more than twelve bags.

At this point, I’ve put down twenty bags—or twenty cubic feet—of topsoil.

And I’m not finished.

I have absolutely no idea how much more I’m going to need.

All I know is that tomorrow morning I’m hooking the trailer back up and heading back to the hardware store for at least twelve more bags.

Because I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow afternoon, I may not have enough time to get all of it spread. But I’m going to give it a shot.

At this point, my front yard has become less of a lawn project and more of a construction project.

I’ve gone from fighting weeds to fighting moss, to moving what feels like an entire truckload of dirt one bag at a time.

And the funny thing is, I started this whole project because I wanted to make my yard look better.

So far, I’ve managed to turn it into a giant dirt patch.

I’m hoping that once I get all this topsoil down and get some grass growing, it will finally start looking like the yard I remember from 1991.

Of course, by the time that happens, I may be too old to care what it looks like.

But at least the weeds will be gone.