Since we live in a climate where fall is crisp and cool, now is the time to attack your lawn for the best results next spring. Before I go on, I do have to mention my own personal feelings towards the lawn in general. Overall, I think having a lush green carpet surrounding your home is great for curb appeal. It also gives the kids and pets a wonderful place to play. But outside of that, it carries a significant cost (both in time and money) and is really not great for our coughing and sputtering environment. I encourage you to re-consider your lawn, replace it with some hardscaping and other low maintenance options and take your kids and dog to the park. OK, off my soapbox and back to making your remaining lawn awesome.

When I worked at the Owl's Nest golf course over in Thornton, they would aerate the fairways every fall. As you can imagine this was quite the undertaking considering the vast expanse of the area (although that area was not vast enough to keep my t-shot out of the trees!). You can and should give your lawn the same treatment. You can rent a machine to do it or just hire someone. Aeration won't take much time, but the benefits are great. It helps cool the soil from the hot summer, allows air, water and nutrients to get deeper into the soil and reduces the compacting of the soil which allows the roots to maneuver more easily. This also primes your lawn for our next step: feeding and seeding.

It surprised me the first time I saw someone fertilizing their lawn in the fall. It seemed to me you would be putting the lawn to bed instead of juicing it up. But as it turns out, fall really is the best time for grasses that thrive in the cooler temperatures. This is the time of year that those grasses are hitting peak growth rate. Most of these grasses are itching for additional nitrogen. You can chat with your local nursery or landscaping professional to learn more about your own grass and how best to feed it this time of year.

Speaking of growth, if your lawn looks anything like mine, it has a few bald spots. (Remember, we're talking about my lawn here!) Fall is the perfect time of year to make some repairs. Adding some new soil and seed to those trouble areas will foster growth and take full advantage of this strong growing season as mentioned above. "I always tidy up any bare patches in the lawn in the fall with some aggressive raking, new soil and seed," notes Badger Peabody & Smith Realty (formerly Badger Realty) agent, Tara Peirce. "The cooler temps and shorter days make for a great growing season and helps those areas recover more quickly," she continued.

Speaking of falling leaves (OK, nobody said it, but I was thinking it!) you have two options when it comes to those pesky lawn coverings. First of all you need to remove them, period. Standing leaves on your lawn promote mold, can kill the grass and they are blocking what precious sunlight we do get from warming and nourishing it. Beyond the standard raking, piling up, jumping in and re-raking, how about turning that annoyance into an advantage? If you keep up with it (once a week is fine), you can simply mow/mulch those leaves into oblivion and give your lawn a little nutritional treat while you're at it. I love this option because I get to mow my lawn (which I love) and remove the leaves without raking (which I hate). It is a win-win!

Since we're still talking about leaves, and it is the perfect season for it, there is one last option for your leaves that I highly encourage you to do. Rake your leaves into a convenient pile. Put together an outfit with old, ratty clothing and tie off the wrists and ankles of said outfit. Stuff said outfit full of leaves and plop it in a chair on the front stoop. You can finish it off with some gloves and boots and don't forget the pumpkin for the head! Now you're ready for those trick-or-treaters. For the professionals out there, I also add a remote controlled speaker so you can really freak people out!