I literally have a reply for every post in this thread. Your municipality has free or low cost compost somewhere. Go get you a couple truck loads.
The key to a beautiful lawn is beautiful roots. Prolong that 1st cut of the season. Let your yard become overgrown and the lawn will grow the root system to support that height of grass.
Only water at dusk. A healthy lawn doesn’t require much water.
Stop Scalping! The #1 mistake I see is people trying to imitate golf turf by cutting low. A healthy blade of grass is ideally 6, 4 inches at bare minimum.
Compost is the best fertilizer. If it comes from your yard it actually strengthens the immune system of your yard and deters pests/invasive species
We have SOHH MANY leaves that we dispose of.
I've always thought I should get serious about processing them and making some topsoil
I'm taking a literal ton.