I never do New Year's resolutions, but I pick a word for the year.

And my word for this year is balance.

And what can we do to balance out and create more spaces in our yard to promote birds and bees and the native plants?

Welcome to how to. I'm Amanda Rivley. So back when I was growing up in the 80s

in suburban New Jersey, a freshly mowed yard was a sign of the good life. Never mind that my

brother and I spent hours inhaling fumes, sweating, arguing, cursing at the mower every week in the summer to make it look that way.

It was pristine. And for some reason, that was all that mattered.

Well, luckily, things are starting to change. Thank God.

A perfect lawn may not be quite so desirable anymore. Take Las Vegas, for example,

which recently outlawed what they call non-functional grass in medians and office parks to help combat drought.

That's a third of their grass gone. Southern California restricted certain households to only

watering their lawns once a week to conserve water,

meaning they're not going to be so pristine anymore.

And maybe most interestingly, more and more people are starting to look at grass differently

and wonder if there might be a better way.

My name is Judy Hanlon, and I am a pediatric speech language pathologist and a spouse of a

retired Army veteran.

Judy and her husband settled into their home near Annapolis, Maryland after two decades of

bouncing around from base to base.

I think we moved 16 times in those 24 years.

So, yeah, there were times where we were someplace just for less than a year.

Other times we, you know, we stayed longer, but lots of rental properties and on-base housing. My husband just retired in January,

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