I have been refraining from using chemical lawn services for 5 years now bec. my young children play around in the lawn and I vaguely thought it might not be good to have the standard lawn chemicals around them. But now I have lots of dandelions etc! And the kids are older. Is there an environmentally friendly, nontoxic, child-safe kind of weed control or standard lawn treatment and do you recommend any particular product, service, or lawn company? Thanks.

Jed, I really can't recommend one certain company. I am not aware of any selective controls for broadleaf perennials other than 2,4-D type products. There are a few OTC products that are non traditional herbicides made from vinegar or soap. they require spot treatment of weed then reseeding or resodding area. Unfortunately these may require more than one application. You could get your kids out there to hand dig the dandelions ;) If you do decide to treat with 2,4-D products you can limit exposure by spot spraying only those areas with weeds and not treating entire lawn. Also concentrate on thickening the lawn through proper fertilizing, watering, reseeding. Whenever there are open spaces you will get weeds. check out our website for some helpful hints. http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/lawntalk/