I know nothing about planting grass

So, in an effort to revive my back yard and actually turn it into a yard rather than dirt with patches of grass, I went to Home Depot to buy grass seeds and/or trays of grass. Well, DH and I have never had to put in a yard before and really don't know anything about it. Since the grass trays were only $6.98 each, I bought 2 of them. I also bought a can of grass seeds. I was actually able to find the same type of seed as the grass in the trays I bought.

Anyway, there were 3 different types of grasses they were selling in the trays. One said tough and good for dogs (which appealed to me because we have dogs). Another said, tough and versatile along with smothers weeds if mowed low. The only thing was that it's more likely to "thatch" than the other type of grass. I'm not even sure what that means, but one natural fertilizer thing I bought says that it reduces thatching, so I can only guess that thatching is not a good thing. The people at Home Depot couldn't even tell me what it meant. The 3rd type of grass was more expensive than the first two and since I'm on a budget, I eliminated that choice.

So anyway - I really have no grass planting tools. Just a pick, a hoe, and a rake. So in the past few days I've done a lot of weed removal and tilling of dirt. Boy is that hard work! I hope I never have to plant grass again. It's good motivation to take care of the grass we will have.

I don't know how well the seeds will work considering I saw some birds in our yard yesterday trying to eat them. I just hope our dogs don't dig up the new grass plugs that are planted. I wonder if I can get DH to plant the other tray......I did one. It's only fair that he does the other right?

Maybe I should take a before picture of my yard, then when the grass starts to grow in (which will probably be in 3 months since the type I choose grows more slowly than other types), I can show you a before and after shot.