when can my children play on a new lawn sown from seed?

[clarelouise]

Hello there,
We are planning to sow a new lawn within the next month.
My question is.
If we sow the seeds at the end of April what is the earliest my children can play on the lawn?
How often should seeds be watered and for how long?
One hour,two hours etc.
We are going to buy a 360 degree sprinkler system.
Thanks for advice.
Clare

[landscaper2]

Bring the ground to a fine tilth by rotavating to about 100mm. Roughly rake and grade the ground to levels required. Shuffle over the whole area to consolidate. Rake again to remove stones/debris over 25mm, making up low-ways and skimming off high spots as you go. Broadcast grass seed evenly at about 40gms per sq.m. and Growmore base fertilizer at recommended rate (cant remember what it is, but it'll be on bag!). LIGHTLY rake over whole area again and leave for nature to take its course. If youre in the UK, there should be enough rain to get the seeds started and they will be up in 10-14 days. When the grass is about 70mm cut by rotary mower with a roller to about 50mm(removing the cuttings). Providing you've had some rain, then cut again every 5 days or so, reducing the cut to about 25mm after say the third cut, when the lawn should be OK for light use. Only water if the grass looks to be drying out.

[beechgrove51]

I would leave sowing out lawn seed until May at the earliest.The main reason being is that we can still have night frosts during April and this would kill the young grass shoots

[nonomaybe]

If the purpose of the grass is for your children to play on i would consider turfing, although you may have already considered this.
I feel that to allow the proposed lawn to develop a good strong sward you should keep the children off until the grass (of a reasonable length) covers completely and this all depends on the weather but if sowing is the only option wait for the soil to warm up thoroughly.Where I am now, Autumn is considered to be the time to sow grass seed!!

[clarelouise]

Hi there,
Thank you very much for your replies.
They were helpful.
Many thanks.
I'll probably wait for another month before sowing.
We are still in the process of digging the garden over and then we'll rake and level off.
This will give us time to do what we have to do,if we leave sowing for another month.
Thank you.
We'll keep the children off as well.
Bye and thank you.
clare